


My Kind's Your Kind (I'll Stay the Same)

by lismicro



Category: Pitch Perfect (2012)
Genre: F/F, Multi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-05-30
Updated: 2013-11-16
Packaged: 2017-12-13 11:08:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 28,168
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/823613
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lismicro/pseuds/lismicro
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Pitch Perfect AU. In which career thief Beca Mitchell robs from the rich and gives to the poor, and Det. Chloe Beale returns the favor.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hello all, thought I'd lend my hand to this lovely fandom. This is going to be quite a long story if all goes well, but we'll see. Hope you guys like it.

## 

Chapter 1

“Mitchell, are you there? MITCHELL!”

“Jesus Christ, Jesse-calm the fuck down! I’m just getting my breath, okay?”

If anyone living in Cobblestone Mansions looked out their window that muggy July night, they would’ve seen nothing out of the ordinary. Actually, they wouldn’t have been able to see anything at all- a moonless night lent itself to pitch darkness- and they certainly wouldn’t have seen a tiny woman dressed in all black, crouching in the shadows of the shrubbery. And that was exactly how Beca Mitchell wanted it.

Plus there was no way Kimmy Jin’s people were going to raid this house before her.

She concentrates on the massive house taking up most of her peripheral vision, curling her lip at the turrets and Roman columns and grotesquely contorted animal shapes in the hedges. Typical rich yuppie, too much money and nowhere to put it. Her side aches; she’d vaulted the cast-iron fence seconds earlier but was almost caught by the spikes at the top. Thank god for adrenaline

Beca pulls her collar towards her mouth and whispers quietly into the fabric.

“You’re sure they’re out for the night? I’m seeing lights from upstairs.”

The earpiece crackles and Jesse’s voice comes back on.

“Positive. Benji’s got trackers on them both. One’s on a beach in Cabo, the other at a strip club in L.A.”

“A strip club?”

“High-class escort service, more likely. Hasn’t moved for…six hours now.”

“Sounds like he’s having a nice time.”

“Oh, I’m sure  _she_  is.”

Beca chuckles before making one last scan over the surroundings. There’s no movement- not even an owl hooting to betray her presence. Closing her eyes, she visualizes the course she’s about to run- through the bushes, behind the fountain. Wait one second, then make another break for the screened back door. Approximately ten yards. Five seconds total.

She feels a shiver run through her body, tensing as the adrenaline begins to buzz through her fingertips. It’s as good as any high and she relishes the tingle that tickles the tip of her ears right down to her toes.

“I’m ready. Beginning insertion.”

“Copy.”

One  more deep breath and the spot where Beca had been crouched is suddenly empty as she sprints across the lawn in light, easy steps. She hits the porch and sees a little grey box, flips open the cover and shines a light down on it. AJAX HOME SECURITY. Perfect.

“Cutting the wire.”

Beca snips the electronic cable and watches the blue light in the mansion disappear. Jesse’s careful exhale tells her everything she needs to know.

“You’re clear. No signal. ”

The door makes no protest as Beca presses her weight against the hinges. She unhooks a Teflon lockpick from her ear- Jesse’s birthday present to her, a whole set from Germany that both made her look badass and cleared her through TSA- and slowly slid it into the lock. A few wiggles and a firm shove later, the door swings open with a small creak.

*

It shouldn’t surprise her, but she always gets a little thrill from breaking and entering. Her first had been a dog cage her neighbors kept filled far past capacity, when she was fourteen. Beca had waited three days before taking matters into her own hands with a hairpin, Vaseline and blunt scissors. When the bastards woke up in the morning to an empty cage and damning photos all over the news, they never suspected the petite little girl next door.

It was her first taste of the criminal life, and she’d loved it. Still loves it. Whatever. She’s getting distracted.

Sure as hell no room for mistakes.

“Okay, I’m in the kitchen. Going dark.”

“Copy. Good luck.”

Beca tucks the tiny mike inside her jacket, pulls her hood down, and gets to work.

 *

It was mechanical, at this point. Move from one end of the room to the other, going left to right, using large appliances as cover. Minimize turning to minimize noise. Her heels make the lightest of squeaking noises as she pivots around corners, eyes scanning every possible hiding space.

The cupboards are fruitless, the pantry even worse. But there’s sterling silver in the glass cabinet and elegant candlestands on the vanity. An envelope of cash on top of the refrigerator. A Rolex sitting on a countertop dish. Beca’s mind races as she slides from location to location, making a mental note of everything- every creaking floorboard, every mussed doily, every speck of disturbed dust. She’s not a professional for nothing.

The stairs lead to an even more lavish upstairs, complete with a dumbwaiter and fuschia color scheme. Beca resists the urge to roll her eyes.

A Macbook. No television, too bulky. A jewelry box-check.

Her heart throbbing in her chest, Beca creeps back down the stairs. The payout is heavy on her back- God, she can practically feel the hip-replacement already- but she perseveres, hefting her backpack with one arm before making it back outside.

Even the muggy night feels good against her sweat-streaked face, and Beca watches for the sign of a car coming up the driveway.

Now it was all Jesse. _C’mon, c’mon-_

Bingo. Jesse’s blacked-out car rolls up on the curb not two seconds later, door wide open. Beca vaults across the threshold and slides the door shut behind her. Her bag jangles as it hits the bottom of the van.

Jesse raises his eyebrows  in the mirror, impressed.

“You alright?”                                                                                         

Beca nods and pulls her hoodie over her head.

“I’m fine. Drive.”

Jesse hits the pedal.

*

They drive in silence, taking only the roads that Jesse’s come to know in the five years they’ve been doing this together. The only point now is to get far, far away. With each passing meter they get from the house Beca breathes a little easier, until they hit the edge of the housing projects and Beca knows they’re safe. For now.

Jesse grins at her and shuts off the engine, clambering into the back.

“What the hell, bro-“

“Dude, this is the best haul so far this year! Open it, open it!”

His enthusiasm is catching, and she nudges the bag towards him with a toe.

“Knock yourself out.”

Jesse digs for a few moments before holding up a sparkling diamond necklace, whistling. 

"Holy crap, Beca, you hit the jackpot. This looks like titanium- can't even imagine how much this baby is worth. We're gonna be rich.

Beca takes the necklace from him and holds it up to the dim car light. He's right- the necklace is fucking _gorgeous_ , titanium filigree with dozens of glittering stones embedded in the strands, practically made to fit the throat of a beautiful woman. She and Jesse aren't going to have to work for months at least . A little flicker of pride flares up in her chest. Well, if she gets caught for this, at least she knows what she's worth. Jesse is grinning at her so brightly that she cracks a smile.

“Damn, Beca. Kimmy Jin is going to hit the roof when she sees it, huh?”

“Yeah, well, make sure Luke melts it down properly before he tries to sell anything to her this time. And tell him if he skims off my commission, I’ll make him wish he never grew balls in the first place.”

Jesse punches her gently on the shoulder.  

“Will do. “

Beca doesn’t look at him as she pulls off her combat boots and jeans, switching it for a pair of sneakers and khakis. She quickly wipes the face paint off her cheeks and whips her hair out of her ponytail, letting it cascade to her shoulders.

There. She looks nothing remotely close to the girl who’d stolen hundreds of thousands of dollars’ worth of diamonds from the richest neighborhood in town. If she and Jesse screwed up, hopefully the police would think the same thing.

“Hey, you need an advance on that money?”

“Yeah, that’d be great. All of Barden Avenue’s rent is due by tomorrow.”

Jesse hands over a thick, padded envelope, and then Beca slides open the door and lands gently on the pavement.

“Until we meet again.”

“Later, loser.”

She closes the van’s doors and doesn’t look back.

*

Barden Avenue isn’t the safest place in the world to go after midnight, deep within the underbelly of the city. Every couple of yards there’s a broken bottle or a cigarette butt, and when Beca walks through the neighborhood there always seems to be some drunk passed out at the corner bus stop. But this is her home, her people, so she jams her hands into her pockets and marches right up to the first door on the block. The white, peeling door swings open on her first knock.

“Beca! Come in!”

The room is small but cozy, the dim light illuminating a living room full of pictures and colorful throw pillows. Beca grins in spite of herself. She and Cynthia Rose go way back- they’d been in Girl Scouts together since they were six, until Beca had been uprooted and replanted cross-country when her parents split up when she was twelve. She’d come back as soon as humanly possible and they’d hit it off again immediately; just two outcasts, one with a gambling problem and one with itchy fingers. Sometimes she thinks that Cynthia Rose should be the last person to want to be friends with her. 

But hey, things sometimes turn out alright.

“Hey girl. You need a hideout?”

Beca smiles. “Nah. Jesse and I just finished up, I came by to drop off some money.” She holds up the thick envelope and places it on the counter. “I know you made rent this month but a little extra won’t hurt.”

“Beca Mitchell…. You know I can’t take money from you again.” Cynthia Rose protests.

“Dude, just take it, okay. It’s not your goddamn fault your shitty ex-girlfriend took everything you ever had.”

"You know, if you're still doing this because you think you need to take care of me or something, you can stop. I'm serious. My debts are all paid off and I'm good now, I'm steady. The money's not the reason you're my best friend." 

"Of course it's not. But it wasn't doing any good where it was. 

"Beca." 

“Take it. You've helped me out all my life, this is me trying to pay you back.”

"You have nothing to pay me back for-" 

"Cynthia Rose. Please." 

They have this conversation every time Beca comes over. Sometimes Cynthia Rose accepts, sometimes she doesn't. But Beca always offers, because that’s what friends do. They stick up for each other, they support each other. That was the code.

This time she doesn't have to try very hard to convince Cynthia Rose. After all, the baby monitor is a new addition to the household.

“How are you sleeping, Cyn?”

Her friend laughs.

“I’m awake right now, at three in the morning. I have work in three hours. Does that answer your question?”

“Still worth it, though? I mean with the hours, and the crying, and the diapers...”

“Completely. Who knew, that shitty ex-girlfriend didn’t leave me with nothing after all.”

Beca only hums and looks over the apartment. She’s right; the room is bright and cheery, littered with paintings and toys and soft baby foam from wall to wall. It doesn't look like the house she and Cynthia Rose hated in their teens. It looks like a home.

“Anyway, I’m exhausted and I think I'll try to go to bed at least. My offer’s still open if you need a place to sleep.”

“I can’t. I’ve got other deliveries to make tonight, I should go.”

“Don’t think I don’t appreciate this, Beca, but please do something for yourself, for once. Just tell me what I can do to help, and I’ll do it. You know I love you like a sister.”

Beca smiles, reaches out for a quick, tight hug, and tugs the door open, shoving her hands into her pockets.

“I love you too- thanks for the offer. I’ll see you soon, Cyn.”

And she’s gone, away from the light and the family and everything else she’d given up long ago. Once out of sight, Beca runs through her mental checklist again, moving down the street with a practiced and weary ease. Stepping up to another apartment door, she knocks quietly. This was her routine, nearly every Friday night.

Amy, the move-in mermaid dancer from Tasmania who had yet to find decent work. Lilly, the quiet Japanese girl who’d been silent ever since she was mugged the first day she was in the United States. Her own friend, who’d been chewed up and spit out by a girl who was supposed to love her. 

All of them dealt shitty hands in life, and no one to pick them up and dust them off. It made Beca furious enough to grab the nearest snobby socialite and punch them square in the face, but she didn’t. She couldn’t.

So she stole from them instead.

Stacie is last on her list, and she whispers “my Robin Hood,” in Beca’s ear before kissing her on the cheek. Her lips are soft and cool against Beca’s skin.

“Hey, Beca. You wanna to stay over?”

Beca shakes her head.

“I have somewhere else to be. But thank you.”

“Okay. Well, you know where I am. Goodnight.”

“Goodnight.”

Stacie’s beautiful and simple and a hell of a lot of fun to be around, and Beca would be lying if she'd said that she hadn't taken the girl up on her offer before. But there’s something about this night that doesn’t sit right with her. A sadness, maybe, a little bit of regret from the days when she could still afford to feel guilty about her job. The night envelops her in warm darkness as Stacie closes her door, and each step she takes makes the pangs in her heart get worse. It’s not fear- everyone knows and respects her in this neighborhood. No, it’s something completely new and different, and it settles uneasily in Beca’s stomach.

There’s really no cure for anything like this. She’d be a fool to think anything else.

* 

She thumbs through the money left in the envelope- it’s more than enough for her to get by- and tramps off towards her own apartment.

*

Beca dumps her gear onto the kitchen counter and triple-locks the door (no such thing as being too safe) before grabbing a pack and a lighter. There’s no way she’s going to sleep tonight- the bed’s stiff and the couch is worse, and the adrenaline hasn’t yet worn off-  and instead she climbs through her bedroom window onto the roof.

When she was a child, she used to do the same thing, when her parents shouting drowned out the noise of the television and she had to find some escape. Of course, her younger self would probably not have just gotten back from committing home invasion, felony theft, and a slew of other things that would put her ass in jail for _years_ , but hey, she’s not a saint.

_Beca Mitchell, modern day Robin Hood._

Her lighter flares in the darkness and Beca inhales a lungful of smoke, wrapping her arms tightly around her knees and staring up at the starless sky. Cigarette ash crumbles between her feet.

Eight year-old Beca Mitchell would have been pleased as punch to be called that, because she’d never wanted to be a princess or a damsel, waiting to be rescued by some dumpy prince. Sixteen year old Beca would have been pissed off, going on some rant about  _survival of the fittest_  and _a dog-eat-dog world_  and  _it’s safer like this anyway._

Twenty-five year old Beca just sits and smokes on a rooftop, looking out across the smog-filled city and waiting for something to change.

It never does.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter Two is finally here- sorry for the wait! Future chapters will be a bit shorter but I'll try to update weekly. I should also preface this by saying I have no knowledge of police work other than what I've seen on TV and in books (ha) so this chapter isn't factually accurate in the slightest. But hey, it's fanfic.
> 
> Please enjoy!
> 
> TRIGGER WARNING: Contains violence, brief description of gore, and the like. Please be careful, I don't want to trigger anyone.

A few miles away, Det. Chloe Beale waits for her prey in complete, total silence. The muggy night isn’t doing anything for her comfort; sweat soaks her collar and her hands as she scrutinizes the still house before her. The standard police riot vest seems to get tighter with each second that they wait in the darkness. If something doesn’t happen soon, she’s going to go stir crazy.

“Are you sure this is the right place?” Tom whispers next to her.

Chloe elbows him in the side.

“Right, okay.”

Suddenly, the blinds rustle at the window of the house and Chloe bolts upright, grabbing for the door handle. The window opens and a man leans out, spitting down onto the lawn below. A match strikes; cigarette smoke unfurls into the air. She reaches for the radio.

“SWAT. This is Beale. We have movement. I repeat, we have movement.”

Chloe’s mind races, the blood throbbing through her ears.

“Are you sure?” Tom whispers. She closes her eyes and forces herself to find some reserve of optimism- the last bit that still remained.

_Yes._

“I’m sure. Go!”

 *

Within the space of a few seconds, she and Tom are out of the car and rushing across the grass with guns drawn, pausing a moment to kick in the door before

Heavy footsteps thump frantically from the upstairs and suddenly, the crack of a gunshot deafens Chloe because it’s close, so freaking close that the plaster splinters inches from her head. Tom’s hand is on her arm and he drags her behind the cover of a ratty couch before SWAT

“Get down, he’s armed!”

A flood of riot shields and uniforms charge up the steps as Chloe follows behind, heart pumping so loudly that she almost shakes from the vibration.

She waits just long enough to hear “he’s jumped out the window!” before cursing and running back out the door to the car. Through the lights she can see him running towards a vehicle of his own, trying to get away.

_Oh no you don’t._

“In the car! Go, go!” Chloe guns the engine so hard the key clatters in the ignition, and suddenly they’re careening through the city streets. Tom grabs the radio from the dashboard.

“He’s going left- Fugitive headed west through Winston Avenue, move to apprehend immediately, over!”

She grits her teeth as the truck takes a hard right. Her speedometer rises- fifty, sixty, seventy.

“Shit. They’re out of position.” Tom says. “We’re on our own for this one.”

They turn the corner at breakneck speed and Chloe grips the wheel so hard the plastic creaks in protest, one foot pressed permanently on the accelerator.

“C’mon, c’mon-“

“Chloe-“

“What?”

“I think he’s headed for the overhang. Above the river, that’s where he’s planning to go.”

She looks at their GPS. Tom’s probably right.

Suddenly, the truck swerves tight around the bend and just stops, leaving Chloe a split second to realize that crap, there is no way they can avoid impact . Tom raises his arms an instant before the back bumper of the truck comes rushing to meet them.

“Woah, hey, HEY-“

And the side of their car slams into the side of the truck.

* 

All Chloe hears is a deafening CRUNCH of metal and feels her wrist give with a blinding, sickening wave of pain. But she can’t stop, can’t see anything other than the man lurching from the car to break into a full run down a dirt path. Tom pushes aside the deflating airbags and reaches for her.

“You alright?”

“Yeah, I’m fine-“

She can’t let him get away.

Her pistol secure and a flashlight in her injured hand, Chloe flings the door open and gives chase. He’s definitely headed for the river now, and she wills more power into her legs as they start to burn. The light reveals a skinny Indian man, his hair pilled in a bouffant on top of his head, with black square glasses. He rushes into a clearing and pulls back from the edge of the overhang just long enough to grin at her.

His smile chills Chloe to the bone.

“Freeze, or I’ll shoot!”

She takes a step forward.

The man dives.

“Son of a-“ she grits through her teeth, flinging down the baton and grabbing her pistol. Her fingers tighten on the trigger, and all she wants is to put a bullet through the back of the man’s skull. Every fiber in her is screaming to just take him down now and worry later, but somebody grabs her arm before she can let her worst judgment take over.

It’s Tom.

“Chloe, don’t!”

Chloe struggles for a second before realizing that the man has disappeared into the water, whether swimming or drowned, she doesn’t know.

But he’s gone, and so is the only lead they have.

*

“Goddamnit!” She drops the pistol in the dirt and pushes her fists against the back of her neck.

So close. They were so close.

“Stop, Chloe- he’s gone, okay? We lost him. I’ll radio Denise upriver, she’ll have roadblocks at every highway entrance if that bastard tries to get through.”

She can’t feel anything.

“We’re going back to search the house.”

“Det. Beale, you’ve been in a car crash, you need to get to the hospital.”

“That’s an order, officer.”

*

Some of the SWAT team is still patrolling outside the house, handling inquisitive neighbors and distributing kits to the forensics team already arriving on site.

“Clear!”

“Clear!”

"This one's clear!”

Someone tells her than they can go inside.

Going in, Chloe prepares herself for the worst. They took pains to develop your “emotional resiliency” in basic, but nothing ever really prepared you for a shotgun to the back of the head, or bodies mutilated in a basement, or words written in blood across the walls. She forces her emotions down and walks inside, shining a flashlight across broken lightbulbs and torn carpeting. It’s not what she expected.

It’s worse.

*

Empty. The whole house is empty, save for a few pieces of crummy furniture. A sinking tightness grows in Chloe’s stomach with each room they search through for clues. Empty garbage cans, piles of wood- nothing of use or even interest.

The second floor produces the same result, but in one room there’s a pile of ashes on the floor. Chloe takes a quick picture and then pulls on a pair of gloves, sifting slowly through the pile.

“The guy we’re searching for sometimes partially burns the victims’ bodies, remember. Be careful.”

“No worries. It’s wood ash, not bone.”

Tom grabs a fireplace poker and rummages through it. He hits something metallic, holds it up to the flashlight.

It’s the badge of the city police department. Chloe has the same symbol sewn onto every garment she wears.

This cannot be happening.

Tom, oblivious, pushes his hat back on his head

“This wasn’t the house we were looking for, Detective. It was just a decoy.”

_A decoy. Just a decoy._

Chloe can’t breathe.

This wasn’t the right house. Which meant somewhere in the city, someone else was being killed. Someone else was getting attacked by a psycho serial killer that had led the entire police department astray.

And it was all her fault.

* 

It’s not until she and Tom are halfway through the emergency room doors before the reality of the situation sinks in and her wrist actually begins to feel like it’s been embedded with hot nails.

By the time the doctor pulls back the curtain, she’s in enough pain to almost forget the entire night.

But not quite.

The doctor takes a careful look at her swelled wrist and pronounces it sprained but not broken, calling in a nurse to get her X-rayed and bound with tape and armed with a prescription for pain meds that Chloe’s never going to take. The whole process seems to be streamlined- her cop status obviously keeps the staff on their toes.

It’s that kind of neighborhood.

“Well, you’re checked out for concussion and your wrist’s been set. Aside from a few cuts, you look to be in a good shape. Does it hurt anywhere else?”

“Nothing. Thank you, doctor.”

He leaves the room and Tom enters, a neat row of stitches lining his hand.

“Shoot, I didn’t know you were hurt. I’m so sorry-“

He waves her off.

“S’nothing. Listen, Jessica is parked out front when you're ready to go back to the base. I'm going to go find the doctor, see if he can discharge us. Be right back.”

“Hey.”

He turns back around.

“You did amazing work tonight. I’m sorry I screwed it up.”

“You weren’t the only one- hell, we all could have done better. This caught us all by surprise, but we’ve got the evidence and the resources and the best damn officers in the force on it. We’ll catch the guy sooner or later. Now it looks like it’ll be later, but we’ll get whoever’s behind this. Don’t let it get you this early, okay?”

Chloe smiles and throws a one-armed hug across his shoulders before he walks out the door.

She waits for a moment, until Tom’s steps disappear down the hallway, and then she makes her escape from the emergency wing. No one really questions a cop, especially one that’s been injured. Outside, another officer is waiting by a fresh car to take her and Tom home.

“Jessica!”

“Yes ma’am?”

“Radio for another car for Tom. We’re going back.”

*

Hours pass.

She looks up at the rising sun and feels her throat tighten in despair. She had been so sure. So sure that this was where he was going to strike next, and now as the sky stained a deep purple that signaled the coming sun, she has nothing to show for it. Nothing.

Buzzz… goes her earpiece. The police radio, nothing but white noise.

When she’d gotten the promotion to Detective, the youngest in half a century, she’d imagined something more productive than this. Something more heroic, slapping the cuffs on criminals and watching families reunited, children saved and cases closed.

Instead, all she has is a massive headache and a peaceful neighborhood, and probably a serial killer laughing at her from the darkness. Chloe runs a hand through her hair and bites her nails to stop the tears from leaking onto her cheeks.

You have too big of a heart, Aubrey would say. You get too invested in your cases and when they don’t work out, you hurt more than you should. That’s not healthy, Chloe.

Aubrey was right, of course. Sometimes Chloe wonders why she doesn’t take Aubrey’s advice more seriously. Best friends are supposed to listen to each other.

Her phone buzzes in her pocket. It’s only five-thirty in the morning, and only one person could be calling her at this time of day. Chloe sighs and presses reply.

“You’re awake, Bree? You didn’t have to do that.”

“I had a lot of paperwork- the mayor wants this disposition by Monday at the latest, the tyrant.” Chloe hears paper shuffling in the background. “There’s a reason the job description for City Commissioner is twice as long as everyone else’s- you know those dirtballs put all of Quinn’s work on my desk before he left? I’m up to my elbows in pink sheets because the scumbag didn’t want this to get out before elections.”

“Hmm.”

Aubrey’s voice stops rambling on about tax audits.

“Something's up with you. Did something happen?"

“Tom and I called SWAT a day early, staked out the Edwards property on the lower east side. There was a perp who escaped into the river, I broke my wrist, we went back to search the house and there was a police badge buried in a pile of ashes. No body, no documents, no nothing. They knew we were coming.”

In the background she hears the sound of a chair scraping against the floor.

“What the- why didn’t you tell me this sooner?? Jesus, you could have jeopardized the entire investigation, or worse, gotten killed!"

“Bree-Bree, I know, okay? I know it was a long shot but they knew about the investigation already, nothing we could have done made a difference. The plans, the neighborhood- they knew it all. Might as well have the slipup be now than later on in the case.”

She doesn’t actually believe what she’s saying, but its better than  _hey Aubrey we have to start all over now._

 "You're sure about this?"

"Positive. There's no way it was just coincidence."

Aubrey somehow manages to sound both tender and disapproving as Chloe closes her eyes and sinks into her seat.

“Fine. I’m taking you off duty until your wrist heals.”

“Please don’t do that.”

“Chloe, you can’t keep doing this. It’s killing you.”

“It’s not doing anything to me but frustrating me. Just let me do my job, okay?”

Aubrey sighs.

“Come back to base, Chloe. You tried your best. It’s not your fault.”

“It is my fault-I was positive,” she whispers, struggling to keep the tiredness out of her voice.

“Two months of planning, it was the perfect break-“

“You tried your best.” Aubrey repeats.

Chloe looks over at her dozing partner and smiles sadly. Jessica had only been her partner for a few months, a rookie fresh out of the academy and even more naïve than Chloe had been. She’d fallen asleep on her first all-nighter too. It seems a whole lifetime ago, but what Chloe wouldn’t give to look at the world in such an innocent way again, without murders and torture and all the worst parts of humanity clawing at her shoulders. All of that went out the window when she was assigned to this case, this case that gripped her in its talons and refused to let her go.

“There’s a free bunk in the on-call room, and Tom’s on documentation. He’ll take care of the red tape for tonight,” Aubrey says. “Take a nap and we’ll talk about it later, okay?”

“Okay. See you in a bit.”

The radio crackles again as Aubrey ends the call, and Chloe, resigned, reaches over to shake Jessica awake.

“Oh my God, I’m so sorry-“

“That’s alright. You made it until five, and on your first stakeout. Not bad.” She tries to sound as cheerful as possible. Jessica looks skeptical.

“So what happens now?”

“We try again. We go back to square one, sift through what we’ve got, make sure we haven’t missed anything, and try again. There’s nothing else to be done.”

Her voice must carry some finality to it, because Jessica doesn’t question her. Still, she looks as betrayed as Chloe feels.

“Yes ma’am.”

“Radio the station and tell them we’re stopping the search at 0400 hours. We’re returning to base.”

As Chloe starts the car, Jessica turns off the siren before it has a chance to trumpet their presence all over the neighborhood.

“Moving out.”

*

Back at base, Jessica yawns a goodbye to Chloe before disappearing into the lockers. The halls are empty, silent, and Chloe heads straight for Aubrey’s office, too tired to bother shrugging off her holster.

Aubrey Posen was not the first person you would think to be running one of the largest police departments in the country, but you’d be eating those words as soon as you got a glimpse of her record. Chloe traces a finger on all the medals and diplomas lining the walls, her footsteps getting heavier with each thump against the linoleum.

She peers through the window of a door and sees her- blonde hair up in a bun, back ramrod straight, poring over documents. Her office is spotless, a stark difference to Chloe’s “a tornado came through and I never got around to picking up” cubicle at the station. A Stairmaster sits in the corner – Aubrey wasn’t anything if not hardcore.

Chloe raps on the door and Aubrey looks up.

“Hey, you’re back.”

“Yeah. I’m back.”

And suddenly Chloe hates, hates her job, because she really doesn’t want to see the look of pity on Aubrey’s face or hear her best friend’s silence. She doesn’t need to say anything, because Aubrey knows. Because she knows Chloe has failed, and that only makes it worse when she pushes away from the desk and comes up to her with open arms. Tears of frustration burn at her eyes as she falls into Aubrey’s hug.

They stand there for long moments, just breathing, as Chloe weeps silently into Aubrey’s shoulder.

“You know I never wanted you on this case.”

“Aubrey, save it, please? I’m about to pass out.”

“Aw, Chlo-“ Aubrey squeezes her shoulders. “It’ll be okay.”

“I shouldn’t be like this,” she whispers. “God, it’s like this case is impossible, and all I see when I close my eyes are those bodies and Jessica doesn’t even know what she’s up against and there’s not enough time-“

Aubrey’s hands tighten their grip on Chloe’s hair.

“It’s not your fault. I told you, it’s because you-“

“-feel too much. Yeah, I know.”

And then Chloe sniffles and lets go, determined to regain some of her composure in front of her superior. _Get yourself together, Beale._

Aubrey only sighs and guides her to the bunks, tucking her in under the blankets and making sure Chloe is comfortable. It makes Chloe feel like a child again, a child after a nightmare that wouldn’t end, and when Aubrey closes the blinds the resemblance is even more eerie. She tries to keep her eyes open, to focus on Aubrey’s face, but the night catches up to her and her eyelids close of their own accord.

“If Denise comes back with news, you’ll tell me, right?”

“Of course. But right now, you need to sleep.”

Aubrey squeezes her hand one last time and leaves the room, leaving Chloe alone with her thoughts. A deep sleep falls upon her, and she dreams of nothing but empty cars and handcuffs.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here is Chapter Three! I know the first two parts were kinda gloomy, so thank you all for sticking with this. Drop me a comment if you feel compelled to do so- always like feedback on what I can do better. Please enjoy!

Okay, so sleeping on shingles wasn’t the best idea that Beca’s ever had. She wakes up to a pigeon settling itself three inches from her face and a sore back that cracked in all the wrong places when she stretched herself out. Great. The sun’s starting to get really hot, really fast so she gets up with a wince, scares the bird way, and climbs back through her window.

The television looks inviting, and Beca doesn’t hesitate to plop herself down on the sofa cushions.

It’s Saturday, thank fucking God, so she doesn’t have to go to work. Not that the pizza place that Jesse’s buddy owned really counted as a legitimate job. They all needed fronts to hide their “secret criminal identities,” as Benji called it, and for the most part it works out fine. Even though it makes Beca gag to think of Jesse as the male stripper he claims to be on his tax returns.

Chugging a glass of water to get the cigarette taste off her tongue, she grabs the nearest box of cereal and shoves a handful into her mouth. Pure sugar made everything go down a little easier

Her phone rings, and its Jesse. Speak of the Devil.

“It’s eight in the fucking morning, Jesse.”

“ _You’re_ up.”

“Not usually. Anyway, this better be good because I’m missing Dr. Phil reruns.”

“I’m glad my company means so much to you. Are you sitting down?”

“Lying down, actually. Why, are you planning to try and have phone sex with me again? Because I told you, I don’t swing that way.”

“Okay, shut up for a minute and listen to me, because this is going to blow you away.”

Beca sits up. She doesn’t even bother to make a pun.

“You know the Anderson house?”

“Congressman Anderson? I’ve heard of him but I don’t know anything about him.”

“He’s gone to the U.S.-Brazil summit in Rio for the week. The house is completely empty.”

“How the hell do you know? That’s clear across the city, Jesse. I don’t know anything about that neighborhood, that turf, the people- nothing.”

“Don’t need to. Luke was so happy about the necklace last night that he wrangled some info out of Kimmy Jin. She was planning a raid tomorrow night, but her guy was suddenly incapacitated last night, some mix-up with the police. She’s willing to sell it to us, full use of facilities and protection included.”

“At what price?”

“You let me worry about that. Point is, it’s ours. This is the opportunity of a lifetime, Beca- this goes through, we’d never have to work again.”

_Never work again._

Beca’s mouth dries up so fast she almost chokes.

She could leave this life. The feeling from last night, the gnawing emptiness that she couldn’t shake- it all lingers uneasily in the back of her mind. She’d get out, do something with her life, leave all of this behind her.

Beca’s up and walking now, the television muted, her phone shaking in her hand. The excitement begins to mount, pumping through her chest, but she can’t bring herself, won’t bring herself to hope. The feeling in her gut subsides for a moment in relief, because the golden ticket seemed to suddenly be in reach, for the first time in her life.

Jesse babbles excitedly into her ear, blissfully ignorant.

“Their home security system is due for renewal in one week. Benji can disable the in-house cameras remotely and all the servants have already cleared out. Y’know, when the cat’s away, the mice will play.”

Beca snorts, careful to keep her voice calm and neutral.

“Are you kidding me, Jesse? I just did a raid last night. The police will be all over this area. This is too good to be true, Jesse. If I’m going in, I need a guarantee.”

“Tell you what, come with me and Benji this afternoon to check the place out. You can see it for yourself- the neighborhood is almost completely quiet.”

“We’ll see about that.”

Jesse hangs up and Beca slowly sets the phone down on the counter. Her hands clench themselves into fists and she presses her forehead to the cool wood of her cabinets. The faces of Cynthia Rose and her child flash in front of her eyes. Amy and Lily. Stacie. They’d be okay, even if she left this business, right? They’d be fine. She didn’t have to take this kind of risk.

But then she sees all of them on the pavement with all their belongings, trudging to the shelter, sleeping in subways and eating out of the Dumpsters, and physically shakes her head to clear away the thoughts. No way in hell she was letting that happen.

She needed this job.

One last job.

 *

A few hours later, Jesse is waiting for her with Benji in tow.

“Hey there, Beca!” Benji, mouth stuffed with gummy bears, sticks up a hand and waves wildly at her. He’s nerdy but sweet, and Beca steals a bear from him before tapping the computer that Benji always seemed to have on his person.

“Is this where the magic is, then?”

Benji bobs his head excitedly as Jesse pulls out of the parking lot, pulling up dozens of pictures and files faster than Beca could type.

“Everything we need, right here. I took the liberty of drawing up three different plans of entry just in case one is blocked. The security system was a joke before, but with some added caution we can be in and out with literally no trace that we were there. They won't know they've been robbed until they go looking for something and never find it."

Together they drive for what seems liking hours before pulling into the nicest neighborhood Beca’s ever seen- and she’s seen (and stole from) quite a few. Slowly they cruise past and park discretely in a neighbor’s driveway. Benji is so excited that he’s practically bouncing in the backseat.

“Just look at that. Have you seen anything so beautiful?”

It’s lovely all right, but she’s noticing things that no normal admirer would- the breakability of the windows, the size of the air vents, the direction and scope of the cameras. Benji’s one step ahead of her, drawing up blueprints and her itinerary for the night, producing a custom headset and earbuds from his pockets. He's planned everything down to the second and the inch. 

Everything is perfect. Everything is ready.

Her hands quiver with something like anticipation, something like fear, because what the hell? What were the chances of two raids like this in a week?

Jesse slaps the dashboard. “Didn’t I tell you this was a brilliant opportunity?”

She should be agreeing with him. She should, like any other best friend/partner in crime, be celebrating along with him, because it _was_ the opportunity of a lifetime. But she can’t ignore the unsettling discomfort telling her to be brave and fess up any longer. Beca grabs onto all her gusts of courage and blurts out her words.

“If this goes through, I’m done, Jesse. At least for a while. I don’t think I can take being on call like this all the time.”

Jesse looks at her incredulously, and then turns to Benji.

“Hey man, can you give us a minute?”

Benji obediently tumbles out of the car, and Beca’s stomach sinks when Jesse turns back to her as serious an expression as any she’s seen on his face.

“Did something happen last night? Because yesterday you were all gung-ho and amazing at the raid, and this morning you actually sounded excited about this thing. I don’t get what changed, or what’s bringing all of this on- I mean, it’s sudden but we’ve taken opportunities like this before.”

Beca wants to scream, because there’s no fucking way to explain it to Jesse when she doesn’t even know how to explain it to herself.  She rubs the tops of her thighs in frustration, her shoulders set as if against a thunderstorm.

“I don’t know what’s different, or what’s changed. All I know is that I’m not happy with this anymore. This life somehow- it’s not enough for me.”

“This _is_ the dream life, Beca. This was the plan, you and me, doing what we’re best at.”

But her initial step has already given her the courage, and she presses on.

“Is it, though? Look, do you really want to go out like Jason last year, cuffed in the back of a cop car? He had a wife and a kid, and now that they’re going to have to wait sixteen years to give him a fucking hug. I don’t want that to be me and I don’t want to have to look over my shoulder my entire life.”

Jesse is speechless, she can tell, but she’s already dug herself into the hole so she might as well keep digging, right? The words come easier and easier, faster and faster as she paints a frantic picture of what she needs to change in her life. Just to make Jesse understand.

“Maybe I’ll ask for more shifts at the pizza place. It’ll be enough to put me through a couple of months at least. Either way, I’m done. Look, I don’t know what happened either, but I got this feeling like something was wrong yesterday, and when you called it was seriously like fate had run its course, or something.”

Jesse scoffs.

“C’mon, Beca. I know you don’t believe in that stuff.”

“I didn’t think I did either. But this is my decision, Jesse, please just respect it.”

Jesse gives her a look, like a _you’ll change your mind later_ kind of look, but he stops questioning her. His face is still confused but confident, and she just knows she hasn’t heard the end of this.

Benji raps on the window and Beca motions him back inside, waiting until Jesse’s safely out of earshot of the house to break the unsteady silence.

“Meet you guys for dinner to celebrate? I’m buying.”

 *

Parked a car garage away, a police car waits and watches.

 *

Chloe Beale is dreaming.

She’s back at her childhood home in the Georgia suburbs, birds chirping in the trees and a faint scent of jasmine on the breeze. Nothing has changed from the photographs framed in her apartment, down to the mailman shuffling letters and whistling to himself. It’s peaceful in a way she’d thought she’d forgotten could exist.

Chloe catches her reflection in a storefront glass and for an instant, she can’t recognize herself. Gone is the restrictive uniform and the stern expression that seemed permanently carved into her face; she’s wearing a yellow sundress and flats, and for the first time in months nothing is bearing heavily in her mind.

Chloe walks. She walks past diners and parking lots, playgrounds and street intersections, until she comes to a great oak tree that she used to climb with her brothers. 

Her little eight year old self is in a tree, looking down at her, bedecked in ribbons and lace and everything else that constituted “proper” Sunday dress, according to her mother. A pair of binoculars dangles from her hand, a pamphlet on polar bears from her pocket. She remembers- she had wanted to be a wildlife photographer as a kid, saving polar bears in the Arctic. 

Chloe looks back at herself, and suddenly feels a rush of compassion for the person she could have been. She reaches out to touch the branch that her younger self is sitting on. The bark scratches her palm.

“I know I'm not the person you wanted to be.”

Her eight year old self looks at her with innocent baby blues, and shakes her head.

“You are."

Then the dream shifts abruptly, uncontrollably, and Chloe nearly loses her footing on solid ground. Little Chloe teeters on the edge for an instant before she falls, and Chloe rushes forward to catch herself-

 *

“Chloe? Chloe, wake up!”

She’s snatched abruptly from dream world to the real world, and it’s Aubrey, shaking her shoulders with a worried expression on her face. And she’s still Detective Beale, and suddenly her childhood seems farther away than ever.

“You were talking to yourself in your sleep. Bad dream?”

Chloe yawns and pulls the blankets from her body, rubbing sleep from her eyes. The sun shines even through the drawn blinds, illuminating the early afternoon as she swings her legs over the edge of the bed.

“No, just a strange one. I was back in Georgia, at my parent’s house. There was a little me-“ she stops and looks around. “How long did I sleep?”

“About seven hours. I didn’t want to wake you up.” Aubrey waits another moment and Chloe knows something loaded is going to come out of her mouth by the way she fidgets and picks at the scratchy bedsheet.

"Something's up, Aubrey. Spit it out already."

“I have good news and bad news. Which do you want first?”

Chloe braces herself.

“Give me the bad.”

“Det. Michaels from the county up north radioed in this morning about a murder they had a couple of days ago. We’re not in strict communication, but it’s definitely one of yours, based on the state of the body. I’m sorry.”

Chloe turns away. An incessant roaring fills her ears and she closes her eyes, numbed. Another one. She’s lost another one. But Aubrey grabs for her shoulders almost immediately, her voice rising in pitch with excitement.

“But the bastard didn’t get away clean on this one, Chlo. Whoever he is, he’s definitely making mistakes now- there’s a treasure trove of evidence, fingerprints and all. Michaels expects us first thing the day after tomorrow to see what else we can get from the scene.”

Chloe’s head snaps up.

“Do you have the file?"

Aubrey hands her a manila folder, and Chloe flips directly to the police report, photos and all. A woman’s cold, dead eyes stare glassily back at her.

“Fourth Avenue. Christine O’Reilly, thirty-two year old. Just moved there two months ago. There were no signs of robbery or assault, just a single gunshot wound to the head.”

“And the left ear?”

“Gone.”

That’s her guy, all right. Sick bastard.

A rage unlike any Chloe has felt seeps into her body and her hands tighten around the paper in her hands until her nails tear through. If there was a moment that she found the most energized in her job, this was it- the noose was tightening, the net was closing, and damned if the pycho was making his escape this time.

Not on Chloe Beale’s watch.

She’s so engrossed that she doesn’t notice that Aubrey’s off the bed and halfway out the door, calling back behind her shoulder.

“Get dressed and get out here, he sent other files along this morning. Do you want me to relay a message for you?”

Chloe looks back down at the dead woman, and traces the woman’s face.

“Tell Michaels we’ll be there bright and early.”

*

“Good Lord, Benji, what makes you think I want to eat at a place that I work? I could tell you horror stories about what goes on back there that would make you never want to eat again. I’m still not completely sure what goes into the sausage,” Beca complains, looking around at her place of employment.

Benji shushes her and pulls the chair out for her. Beca’s toes can’t touch the floor.

“Honestly, the guy needs our business. Just go with it, okay?”

Jesse whips out the menu with a flourish and motions the waiter over.

“I want the Slaughterhouse, no onions, peppers, or mushrooms.”

“Dude, that’s a heart attack on thin crust.”

“That’s why I’m getting it, doofus.”

Beca rolls her eyes, because for thieves who could probably work for the State Department her friends really can be idiots.

When they finish ordering, Benji and Jesse turn their attention to rating every woman in the establishment on order of hotness. It’s entertaining for about a minute, but then they try to get Beca to join in and nope, she’s not going there.

“I’m going to the bathroom.”

It’s not in the finest of conditions, the bathroom (she knows this) but at least it’s quiet. Beca stares at herself in the mirror, running a tired hand through her hair. Her skin is already pale and the stark fluorescent lights aren’t helping any. The Feeling (she’s already decided that it deserves a capital F, because proper nouns seem appropriate for how this thing has taken over her life recently) bubbles back to life in her stomach now that she’s started overthinking again.

Great. More fuel to the fire. Knock it off, Beca.

She’s just reaching for the door when it swings back out. Hard.

“Whoa-“

The heavy wooden door smacks right into her face and literal stars burst behind Beca’s eyelids, to accompany the agonizing pain in her face. Jesus, that’s going to hurt in the morning.

“Oh my God!”

Beca tries to step back but there’s suddenly someone in her personal space, gripping her hand tightly enough that she can’t escape. She lifts her eyes and suddenly stops trying to break free.

  
*

This woman is….god, gorgeous.

She’s never felt an instant attraction to anyone but this woman’s piercing eyes root her to the ground, so blue they give a new definition to Beca of the word. A fiery blaze of red hair falls softly down the woman’s shoulders and there’s enough of a height difference that Beca knows she’ll have to pull the redhead down by the collar and rise up on her toes to properly kiss her soft, smiling lips. That smile quickly shifts into a frantic look of worry at Beca’s welfare, a sort of tender concern that makes something pang in Beca’s chest. As if that weren’t enough, then the woman pushes her hair back behind her ears and _fuck_ , the whole world has been lying to Beca about what beauty was.

“I am so sorry! Are you okay?”

Beca’s tongue goes limp in her mouth and the most she can babble is a “s’okay” before she flushes to the very tips of her ears. God, she must be red as the woman’s hair now.

“Are you sure? I know I hit you pretty hard, I wasn’t even looking where I was going.”

“I’m fine.”

Still looking unsure, the woman lets go of Beca’s hand and brushes aside her jacket accidentally, and that’s when Beca sees something that sends immediate warning bells blaring in her head - a shiny detective’s badge, sitting on the woman’s hip like a fucking loaded pistol.

Every nerve in Beca’s body goes haywire and she yanks back like she’s been shocked.

“Alright, well, I- I have to go.”

“Of course. Sorry again!”

And then Beca bolts.

  
*

Benji and Jesse are arm-wrestling across the table when Beca marches up to them, grabs their arms and pulls them out of the restaurant. Once they’re out of sight behind the Dumpsters, Jesse snatches his arm back and looks at her like she’s sprouted an extra eye.

“What the hell?”

“Cop. In the bathroom.”

Jesse instantly peers over the corner.

 “They’re here already? Shit, I’m going to murder Luke. We’re going to have to cancel everything, it’s too risky.” Jesse looks even more devastated than she does, so she grabs him by the shoulders.

“Dude, calm down, okay? If she knew we were involved we’d both be at the police station by now. She doesn’t suspect a thing. She even apologized for bumping into me in the bathroom.”

Jesse relaxes. “So there’s nothing to worry about.”

“Nope.”

Beca closes her eyes and tries to remember the way the woman’s hand had lingered on her own for one perfect moment.

She prays that she’s right.

*

_Wow._

All Chloe can do is watch the tiny brunette drag two complaining guys out of the dinner, her mouth open in shock. It’s a full minute before she turns back to the sink, looking at her own reflection in the mirror. A long exhale releases itself from her lungs.

The way the woman had looked at her…

Aubrey stares at her when she returns to their table.

“What?”

“You have this funny look on your face. Like you’ve seen a ghost or something.”

Chloe hums.

“Not a ghost, but maybe an angel.”

Aubrey’s eyebrows go so far up they almost disappear into her hairline, and Chloe watches as her best friend crosses her arms and leans back slightly in her chair.

“Describe.”

“Amazing bluish-hazel eyes, long brown hair, adorably short. She had a couple of piercings and the softest skin I’ve ever seen- I don’t know how to describe her, she was just…wow.”

Even now she can’t find the proper words.

“Well, what’s her name?”

“She ran out before I could ask.”

Aubrey tilts her head to one side, digesting the information. Chloe looks aimlessly out into the sinking sun and rests her chin on her hand, thinking back to the strange woman who had somehow just breezed in and out of her life. The strangest tingle still lingered in her fingertips where the woman’s hand had brushed her, and Chloe rubs them together in fascination. She looks down- they look no different. And yet…

Aubrey notices, because Aubrey notices everything.

“Maybe you’ll see her again somewhere.”

Chloe swears that something stirs in her bones.

“Maybe.”


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Note: There was a slight continuity error in the last chapter. It was minor but has been fixed. Thank you, as always, for your patience and support!

In hindsight, the first indication that some conundrum has just stumbled into Beca’s life comes when she’s alone again in her apartment, with no Benji or Jesse to rag on or pelt small objects at. The floor creaks as she pads softly across the floor, pulling herself through the window to sit in her customary spot on the roof. Her pack of cigarettes is still in there, somehow, and Beca only hesitates for a moment before lighting up. Damn things are probably doing more damage than any germs are ever going to do anyway.

The moon is out but shrouded by clouds, so even Mother Nature can’t give her a distraction from herself anymore. Midnight looks blue from this angle, and she runs an exhausted hand through her hair.

The problem, Beca eventually decides, is that she doesn’t believe in fate. There was no possible way that two life-changing happenings, let alone three, could fall into her lap at the same time. First the greatest (and last) raid of her life, and then the sudden surge of ambition to do something useful with her life. And now there was this mystery woman that Beca had met for all of thirty seconds, yet had managed to settle deep into her thoughts and keep her awake for hours upon hours. The way the woman had held herself, had held Beca for an instant, had burned its way into Beca’s senses. The memory of the woman’s gentle smile shone almost as brightly as the badge on her hip.

Almost.

If she could believe, she would. But she’s not that kind of person, so something was bound to go wrong. Something was going to be monumentally fucked up, soon, and all Beca could do was wait for it to snatch everything out of hands and boot her ass over the cliff.

She sighs and the smoke escapes in a dense cloud from her mouth. The rings float up and disintegrate when they escape her vision.

_Well, shit._

Beca gets so caught up in her thoughts that she doesn’t notice the first few drops of rain start to fall, and by the time her cigarette has fizzled out in a damp hiss, her hair is already dripping rain down her collar. Getting back into her apartment is a struggle with wet hands, and by the time she hauls herself back inside there isn’t a hope for her clothes.

Beca huffs and grabs a towel.

Still, all she can see is soft red waves and sandy blue eyes, nagging like a long lost conscience at the back of her neck. It suddenly infuriates her; how can a woman she doesn’t even know affect her this much?

It’s no good. She’s only going to drive herself insane like this; she needs to get out of here.

Beca snatches her coat off the hook and grabs her keys.

*

Club Barden is exactly the kind of place that mothers warn their children about; carefree women and men grinding indiscriminately against each other in the dark, the sickly sweetness of liquor mixing with the burn of cigarette smoke, bass turned up so high that every surface in the place throbs with the pulse of the tireless, endlessly creative DJ. The line to the bathroom is always a dozen deep and the back alleyway always smells like pot. Picking pockets here is a waste of time; no one carries anything but condoms and a few bucks for a cab.

Beca fucking loves it.

Tonight, though, the bouncer at the entrance takes one look at her face and lets her in, pointing out a solitary table in the corner. She’s barely sat down when a girl sidles up to her, tapping black-painted nails on the wood. Beca can barely see her own hand in front of her face in the darkness but she smiles halfheartedly anyway.

“Hi.”

 “You here alone?” The girl ventures, the club lights illuminating her face for a moment as they flash by. She’s pretty, but her hair is dyed an unnatural crimson that can’t compare to the natural auburn that Beca has suddenly discovered a weakness for. She can’t bring herself to even lie to the woman, choosing instead to shake her head.

“No thanks, I’m just here for myself tonight.”

The girl shrugs and moves on. Beca flags down a waitress before she can properly regret turning down a pretty girl on a night where she honestly could have used the comfort. But alcohol quickly blunts her self-pity, so it isn’t that bad.

She’s not sure how many minutes pass before the song changes to a fast techno beat and the tables around Beca empty faster than the starting line of a marathon, the dance floor quickly filling. Beca lets her Jack and Coke move in small jerks across the wooden table, idly stirring the rapidly melting ice in her glass.

The mass of people is intoxicating to watch.

Suddenly, she spots a flash of red hair and nearly ruptures herself bolting out of her chair, craning to catch another glimpse. Hope is dangerous at this stage in the game, but she's powerless to stop the urge she has to run after it. Just as she's taking a step in what she hopes is the right direction, a hand grabs her shoulder.

“Beca!"

Beca waits a beat before turning around.

“Stacie!”

The girl in question beams and adjusts her bra cups as Beca tries not to stare; there’s a _lot_ of Stacie on display, and right at eye level. But looking back to the dance floor reveals only a blonde with hair tinted red in the light, not the person she was hoping for. Stacie, unperturbed, throws an arm around Beca and plants a sloppy kiss on her lips.

“My little Beca burrito! I can’t believe you’re here! You look so hot tonight!” She actually looks like a mopey dishrag someone left in the sink, Beca knows, but there’s no reasoning with Stacie when she talks in loud exclamation points. So instead Beca returns Stacie’s tight hug and holds her out to arm’s length, hoping that her look of disappointment doesn’t show too easily on her face.

No such luck.

“You’ve got your face on.”

“What face?”

“That I’m-single-and-lonely face. But you’ve got your eye on someone here, don’t you? Who is it? Ooh, that Goth girl with the piercings is totally hot! Or what about that chick with the water bottle in her hand?” Beca squints and can just make out the Absolut label from a distance.

“That’s vodka, Stace.”

Stacie waves her hand airily.

“Vodka, water, it doesn’t matter. That girl over there is still checking you out, Beca! Oh, never mind, she has a riding crop in her hand. You’re not into that, are you-“

Stacie manages to go through several more girls, pondering each one’s ability to “butter Beca’s biscuit,” before Beca finally yells loudly enough over the music for her scatterbrained friend to stop.

“Stacie! I’m really not looking for anyone, okay? Let it go.” Not for anyone who wasn’t her, anyway.

Stacie sticks her lip out in a pout and places her hand over Beca’s on the table. It’s not much, but Beca musters the energy to squeeze it tightly.

“Look, I’m sorry. Just- I just wanted to get out of my apartment, maybe find something to do to take my mind off things.

At that, her friend brightens immediately.

“Something, not someone.”

“Hey, I know the difference! My friend Dave over there mentioned free DJ lessons. I mean, I think he got a load of the twins when he promised it, but a deal’s a deal! Is that something interesting for you to do?”

Stacie motions over to the DJ booth, where a skinny man waves enthusiastically (maybe too much so) at Stacie as she jumps up and down. His headphones hang limp around his neck and his hands handle the soundboard with practiced skill. It’s never occurred to Beca how fucking skilled DJ’s were, surrounded by thousands of dollars of delicate equipment, able to create tapestries of sound with a surgeon’s precision and a poet’s artistry.

Maybe it’s the alcohol that brings out the inner sappy musician, but Beca feels her spirits genuinely lift at the prospect of working the turntable, at an actual club no less. Distractions. Distractions are good.

“DJ-ing, huh?”

Stacie beams and grabs her arm with one hand, downing the rest of Beca’s drink with the other.

“Well, c’mon!”

 *

The next morning, Chloe throws another wad of paper into the trash can and tries not to snap at Aubrey when her best friend throws yet another pile of files on top of her desk. When she slams down her pen with a little more force than necessary, causing Aubrey to glare sternly at her.

“For the last time, all this has to be filed and processed before we can get on the crime scene. I don’t make the rules, Chloe.”

Chloe feels boredom making its inroads on her mind. Outside, her face betrays no sign of the stress that was mounting inside of her.  Makeup and coffee had seen to that. But her insides coiled up tightly, ready to explode at a moment’s notice. Blind rage could only fuel her for so long; once that was gone, there was just an urge to do, to get her hands dirty and feel progress being made. Fat chance that could happen when she was stuck behind a desk.

The tip of her pen carves indents into the court-mandated papers that she begins to fill out, one by one.

Someone put her out of her misery.

And then there was the woman from last night. Chloe closes her eyes and swears that she sees her again, all large liquid eyes and brown locks and an apprehensive expression that managed to seem innocent and sexy all at once. Chloe rests her chin on her hand and lets herself daydream for a moment,

Aubrey’s radio suddenly buzzes.

“Wait, hold up. Tom just got in.”

Sure enough, a few minutes later he shows up at her door. Aubrey rises, regal as a queen, and smooths the front of her skirt with perfect professionalism.

Chloe just leans back in her chair and cocks an eyebrow at Tom.

“Officer Moore. Anything to report?”

“I was patrolling outside the Anderson house when a suspicious car started to circle it. I waited a day just to be sure, but that same car definitely made more than one trip around the neighborhood. It doesn’t match any of the cars owned by the neighbors or even that were rented out from the local rental. I’ll put it in writing later, but I request more support to monitor the site for a possible robbery.”

Chloe watches Aubrey ponder the decision.

“All right. But take the rookies with you, I want them to get some experience on burglaries. Give me a moment, I will notify SWAT that you will need them shortly.” As soon as Aubrey turns and leaves the room, Tom visibly sags and wipes beads of sweat off his forehead. Chloe swivels around to prevent him from seeing her laugh.

“Hey, Chloe?”

Surprised, Chloe swivels back around in her chair.

As Tom walks to her desk he actually takes off his hat and stands there twisting it, a rosy flush in his cheeks. If it was any other day Chloe would grin about how painfully awkward he looks. It’s actually spellbinding to see him transform from the stone-cold cop she’s known for years into something roughly resembling a high school boy.

“Sorry about the case again. I know how hard you’ve been working on it.” Tom leans closer to her and it’s so obvious that he’s trying his hardest to be sympathetic that Chloe can’t help but smile a little back.

“It’s alright. Excited about the weekend?”

“Oh hellyeah, better than paperwork.” he says, rubbing the back of his neck nervously. "Look, I get that you're caught up in this case, but do you want to get some dinner together tonight? Just the two of us?" 

The question catches her completely off guard and for a moment, all she can do is stare at his beet-red face. It suddenly occurs to her that he’s still waiting for an answer, that time hasn't actually stopped and yes, those words did come out of his mouth. She says it before she even thinks.

“As friends, right?”

“Um, no. I was kinda hoping it could be a date?”

He’s handsome, charming, a little dull but sweet to his core. And damn reliable when she needed him to be. But he’s not remarkable, not in the slightest, not even half as interesting as the girl that she’d met in a bathroom stall. He’s a colleague and a rare friend in the force that she just can’t lose to a doomed romantic venture.

But mostly he didn't sweep her off her feet. And now that she's knows that it's possible for something like that to happen, well...

She opens her mouth to shoot him down politely, but then she sees Aubrey’s curious face peering out at her from the small door window. Looking at Tom again, she watches the hope and the earnestness play out across his face and relents. She could do worse than Tom- a lot worse.

Anyway, chances were one in a million that she’d see her unknown woman again- there was no use dwelling on it, they were just the facts. Life bites that way.

And it’s _Tom_.

“Okay. Sometime around seven, then?”

“Great, it’s a date!”

He nearly walks into the door on his way out, swimming in happiness. Aubrey enters soon after, nods shortly at him, and stands with her arms crossed facing her best friend. Chloe rolls her eyes when she sees the smug expression on Aubrey’s face.

“Tom, huh?”

“He’s just- he’s a good guy. I don’t want to shoot him down before he even gets a chance to try.”

It’s girl talk at its finest, and Chloe realizes suddenly that this is what she’d been missing with Aubrey. A chance to talk about something other than the murders, a chance to be the Chloe again. The relief rushes over her in a cool backdraft. Already she’s breathing a little easier, smoother than before.

Score one for Tom.

“You know I approve of him, right? I’m not going to chase him out like you did your last incompetent boyfriend.”

“Oh c’mon, Aubrey, he was top of our class. Boring as hell, yeah. But for the record, I thought he had some potential.”      

“He was practically a drug dealer!”

“Jesus, Aubrey, he had one conviction for pot in college. One, and he wasn’t even charged with distribution or paraphernalia! You can’t just judge people based on where they live or how they dress or whatever it is that you do. Tom’s a nice guy, but he isn’t the only one.”

“Okay, okay!” Aubrey holds her hands up in defeat, and Chloe steeples her fingers in victory.

The stack of papers on her desk seems lighter than it did a minute ago. It’s going to be a good day.

 *

It’s finally time.

Her fingers dance along the edge of the couch, the cabinets, the mantel. Her head bops to imaginary music, and every time she tries to sit it feels like her feet are on fire. She can’t stop moving, can’t stop shuffling around her apartment as she waits for Jesse to come pick her up for the raid- the Ultimate Raid of Ultimate Destiny, as Benji is calling it.

All her equipment has been triple-checked and polished until you could see each individual speck of dust that landed on the titanium. Her black turtleneck and cargo pants have had all extra threads clipped away and buttons re-sewn on.

It’s as good as she’s ever going to get. They are giving it literally everything they have.

She hears the first knock and opens the door to find Jesse with the least reassuring look his face that she's ever seen. Fear.

“Please don’t be mad at me, Beca-“

“What the hell-“

She stops and crosses her arms when she sees who is standing behind Jesse.

“Rebecca.”

“Bumper.”

A bitter taste fills her mouth, just saying his name. Sure, it’s all in her mind, but Lord, Bumper Allen was so scummy that he practically radiated garbage in all directions. Beca’s hands clench into fists at her sides; it takes everything inside of her not to knock the smug grin off his face.

The stories run wild through Barden Avenue and every other neighborhood in this part of the city. Beca first heard the rumors when she’d moved here years ago. She’s watched them grow more and more fantastic, more and more dangerous with each whisper coursing through the streets and the ever-present black market underground. Bumper involved in a Mexican cartel operation. Bumper Allen fixing NBA games for lazy millionaires on illegal gambling sites. Allen and the Treblemakers forming an armed street gang to dole out vigilante justice by their own measurements.

What was true and true and what was false, she had no clue. But Bumper had power- unimaginable, near ultimate power by this city's standards- and biting her tongue comes a little easier when she hears Benji’s terrified breaths from the hallway. 

“What’s this I hear about you being nervous?” Bumper asks, his voice oily and slick. Beca glares at Jesse behind him, only to be met with Jesse mouthing _I’m-sorry-it-was-an-accident_ at her.

“I would hate to have to have my information…misused by an incompetent girl. Information that was so well planned, and invested in, and...well, _expensive_.”

“Wait, what?”

Any thoughts of Bumper are suddenly pushed to one side as she grabs Jesse by the shoulder in a fury.

“You got the information from _that_ -from _him_? That’s how we know about this!? Are you fucking crazy??”

No fucking way. She’s not fucking taking anything from Bumper Allen. Already she can see her pledge to be on the straight and narrow being tarnished, blackened. Who knew what kind of illegal, dangerous methods Bumper used to get information.

She didn’t want a single fucking part of it.

“Beca, I am _hurt_. By the tone of your voice, I would almost assume that you didn’t appreciate the information that I so generously gave you two.” Bumper clutches mockingly at his chest.

“That’s bullshit.” There’s a little bit of satisfaction in the way Bumper flinches back a little at her viciousness. “There’s always something in it for you, and I want to know what it is.”

Bumper takes a threatening step forward. Suddenly Jesse’s hand is on Beca’s shoulder, trying to be reassuring, but even she can feel him tremble as Bumper removes his sunglasses and tucks them into his shirt. He is smiling, but a smile that reminds Beca of a cobra who knows that finally, the mouse has run out of hiding places.

“We can talk about his later- you have limited time and limited resources. Just know that I get a generous cut of the profits and so do you. We are on the same side here, Beca. Us against them. Or have you forgotten?”

But he’s right. They don’t have time to spat about honor and motives right now, not if they wanted to pull this off. So she lets it go, even through her conscience screams out for her to refuse and run off.

Think of Cynthia Rose and Barden Avenue.

Think of the mystery cop.

“Fine.” Beca spits.

Then she walks away, because she has bigger things than Bumper Allen to worry about right now. Benji comes up to her and hands her the ever-familiar earpiece, and that’s when it sinks in. Christ, she’s actually about to do this.

She’s ready.

 *

Jesse’s car gets her all the way to the house behind the Andersons. He helps Beca down from the car and grasps her by the shoulders. Beca watches his eyes, warm and brown underneath the streetlamp, and feels her adrenaline go into overdrive.

“You can do this.”

“I know I can.”

Jesse squeezes her one last time and lets her go.

The lawn is simple, since Benji has already remotely deactivated any remaining monitoring systems and Jesse has carved the prints off her shoes. Creeping behind the bushes and courshinf next to the air conditioning unit, Beca pauses. No sound. She hefts her power screwdriver, muffled by Benji’s specifications. One bolt comes loose quickly; the others take a little more pressure.

“Hurry up, we’re behind schedule.”

“By like half a minute. Relax, I’m going.”

Beca licks her lips in preparation, then begins to crawl steadily through the ventilation towards the house. Her elbows scrape across the smooth foil, shifting precariously under her weight. Sweat drips into her eyes bit by bit but she sees the dim light up ahead.

All according to plan.

“I’m seeing a small light.”

Sure enough, a small lamp has been left on by the Andersons, no doubt to deter burglars like herself. Quickly Beca slips into old routines and habits, peeking around corners, keeping all her weight on her front toes to minimize sound. It’s so simple and familiar that Beca lets herself take a breather, her heart rate settling.

“This place is deserted. You were right.”

There isn’t a soul to be found, not a person or servant or dog in sight. She’s ready to begin the theft proper.

“Entering the kitchen now.”

Surprisingly, there is a jewelry box placed right on the coffee table, reflecting the moonlight pouring through the window above. A strange place for jewelry, sure, but rich people- who knew what kind of neighbors they were trying to impress. Beca doesn’t think twice before reaching out and touching the center diamond of the whole spectacle.

“Wow. You should be seeing this.”

Suddenly it strikes her that the house is far too quiet for a house left alone for a weekend. There is no refrigerator humming, no generator running, no appliance large or small that is still on. None of it makes any sense. But even then, it’s still too little to compensate for the pure, delicate silence that roars louder in her ears than any sound ever has.

Her entire body jolts when she discovers why.

The switch is on but there is no static in her earpiece. She’s been talking to herself all this time, in the darkness. Alone and without support.

Quickly, she flips the switch back and forth, shakes it, whispers curses at it. Nothing works. Beca shines a flashlight beam on the back. Its new, made with Benji’s custom touch. It shouldn’t be malfunctioning.

Something is definitely wrong.

“J.”

Her earpiece has definitely gone silent, and Beca feels the first pinpricks of panic flood into her system. The plan, the perfectly crafted plan, was crumbling into ashes faster than she could watch.

Remain calm, Mitchell.

She presses herself to the wall, waits another shuddering breath before whispering into the microphone one last time.

“Aborting mission, J. I repeat-“

Suddenly the door bursts open and more police officers than Beca’s ever seen at one time pour into the house, blinding floodlights exploding behind her eyelids. The bracelet falls from her hands to the floor and the clack sounds deafening even in the din.

“Freeze!”

Beca instantly goes numb, her hands coming up automatically as an officer pulls her arms behind her. The flash of pain barely registers as everything in her mind grinds to a crushing halt.

What-

She hears, dimly, the squeal of tires against asphalt. Jesse and Benji are long gone.

The first cop looks her dead in the eye, his face stiff and emotionless, while his partner snaps a pair of handcuffs onto her wrist with a grinding click. Everything moves in slow, sluggish movements and all Beca can do is watch the officer’s lips form words that she can’t grasp.

“You have the right to remain silent…”

So that was it then, Beca thinks. Her mind races from thought to thought, analyzing, calculating. She’s not feeling anything yet-she can’t. This can’t be happening. A fog dims her senses out of necessity, because if she lets herself think about it she’s going to lose her mind.

_The last job._

_It was all planned._

_By Bumper?_

_By the mystery woman?_

It doesn’t matter.

“…until you talk to an attorney. Do you have any questions?”

Beca shakes her head numbly.

It’s done.

She’s caught.

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm not going to have access to a computer for a week, starting Thursday, so the next update may be late. I'll definitely write on paper and maybe be able to post on my phone, but no promises.
> 
> That said, thank you all for sticking with me thus far. There's no end in sight yet!


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So sorry for the wait. This chapter is extra-long to make up for it, and I'll get back to regular updates soon. Thanks for reading, guys!

Chloe, yawning, makes her way over to the coffeemaker and watches the precious black liquid bubble into her mug as she leans against the counter. The clock strikes past seven in the morning, mechanical ticking the only sound other than the hum of the air conditioner and the faint buzz of the lighting unit above her desk. The sun  has already risen but the buildings surrounding the station block out all but the strongest rays.

The second graveyard shift- midnight to eight- is usually about as appealing as the day after Mardi Gras; exhausting, boring, and growing exponentially worse as time passes. But Chloe Long nights are prime thinking nights.

And she has a hell of a lot to think about.

Her date with Tom, for instance.

Chloe feels a headache coming on and reaches into her drawer for an aspirin, nearly scalding herself as she washes the pill down with a wince. It’s probably more traditional for detectives to use scotch rather than boiling coffee, but she’s not that far gone yet. Her wrist knocks against the wood and she winces, still feeling a ghostly ache from her latest run-in with the criminal underwood. With Tom.

…Which brings her mind back to him, again.

There’s this thing that usually happens to her on first dates. Her palms get overly sweaty and her closet goes from Type-A organized to bachelor-pad messy in an hour or less. She sprays so much perfume in the air her apartment smells like the ladies counter at Sephora’s. If it’s a date she’s been looking forward to, she suddenly has a tough time talking to waitstaff and pushing elevator buttons and her laugh always seems too loud for her body.

The actual date is almost worse. Conversation is always awkward at first (Do you like Chinese food?-Of course I love Chinese food, who doesn’t?) and she ends the night starving because she’s terrified of getting parsley in her teeth. And then there’s her taste in romantic partners. Most of the time her projections of people far outweigh their actual personalities, and she goes back to her apartment disappointed and disillusioned with her love life.  

But then there are few first dates that captivate her, that make her lay awake in bed for hours afterwards, smiling goofily at the ceiling and playing back every minute on endless loop in her head. People who intrigue her and warm her to the very tips of her fingers, who. People who make her want to ignore every piece of advice Aubrey had ever given her and invite whoever it was inside for "coffee".

Tom hadn’t been one of those dates.

Oh, he’d been charming and gentlemanly, pulling out her chair at dinner and tipping the waiter generously after the meal was over. She remembers smiling most of that time, watching him try to impress her. He hadn’t even tried for a kiss at the end of the date, only telling her that he’d see her the next day at work and to have a nice night.

No, it was more the little things that bothered her. Talking with easy familiarity about the station and her demon of a case, even though it was the exact thing that she wanted to forget for a few hours. Assuming that she hated olives when she loved them. Treating her like she was porcelain, like she might shatter into a million pieces if he allowed her to drive herself home or pour her own wine. Even their camaraderie felt more like a brother and a sister than any sort of attraction, and by the end of the night she’d finally given up on thinking that he’d make a good boyfriend.

Or thinking that she’d get a certain woman off her mind with his help.

She knows she’s being unfair. Tom had been her colleague for years, but he’d only been her date for a few hours. No reasonable person could be expected to know what she, for some reason, expected him to know about her. Relationships required time and work from the very beginning. Dimly, Chloe wonders when she’d stopped making that effort.

Her brain gives her another twinge of pain when she considers how she’s going to let him down gently, already imagining the disappointment on his face.

The phone on her desk suddenly rings, deafening in the silence. She takes a quick, confused glance at the clock- who would be calling at two in the morning?- and picks it up.

“Detective Beale here.”

“Chloe?”

It’s Tom.

“Tom? What’s happened?”

“Could you come down to the prison, please? I’m going to need your help.”

 

*

 

One of the requirements of being in Beca’s line of work was to have nerves of steel- no, make that titanium. Maybe it wasn’t explicitly explained in Thievery 101 or by one’s associates at the welcome party, but the first lick of the flames before the first raid always weeded out the weak. A few nights in the business, and you were tough or you were gone.

But nothing really prepared a thief for the moment when every fear she’d ever had came true.

The hot vinyl of the police backseat, sticky in the summer warmth, itches at her legs.  She keeps her eyes down, not meeting the eyes of the officer who takes a backwards glance at her at every stop sign, as if she’d try to throw herself against the window or something. As if that was possible- her wrists are locked securely behind her and the windows don’t roll down. Even the doors are missing their handles on the inside.

Beca rests her head against the window, eyes unseeing as she stares blankly out the dirty glass. Somehow the only thing she can see is Cynthia Rose’s face, disappointed and panicked and painfully accurate even though it’s been years since she’s seen something like it on her friend’s face. Fear and shame push against her defenses in equal amounts, threatening to overwhelm her with their relentless pressure. Somehow this feels like the worst punishment possible; unable to run or distract herself from the knowledge that it’s over, she’s done, and all her well-made plans are burning to cinders at her feet. And all she can do is feel it.

She can’t even bring herself to think about prison yet. She can’t.

Beca closes her eyes.

The ride lasts only a couple of minutes before the ever-lit police station appears at her window and the officer shuts off the engine, opening her door and yanking her roughly out of the car. She wobbles unsteadily for a moment before being frog-marched through the doors and into fluorescent lights. They blind her for a moment- she’s not used to nighttime lights, and in that moment her hands are uncuffed  and her finger prints are pressed into ink.

“Step on the line, please, and face the camera.”

A flash of the lens later, and the reality of the situation sinks in a little deeper- she’s a criminal now.

One of the officers peers at her as she’s ushered back into handcuffs, attached at the other end to a hard wooden bench.

“What’s your name?”

Something- trapped animal instinct, or maybe years of distrust of police- tells Beca to shrink back, and she fixes her features into a look of defiance before shaking her head.

“I want a lawyer.”

Anger creases the man’s face. “You have to tell us your name, miss. Legal representation isn’t going to change whatever it is. I suggest you cooperate unless you want to land yourself in jail for a lot longer than you expected.”

Beca stays silent.

The other officer, apparently named Tom Alexander, pulls his partner away and stares down at Beca.

“Look, you can stay silent all you want, but we’re going to find out what your name is sooner or later. If you’re trying to protect your partner it’ll just turn out worse for you in the end. Use your common sense here.”

When Beca still says nothing, he sighs and unlocks her handcuffs once again, escorting her deeper into the prison, to the cells. The lights stay the same, harsh and sterile, but the paint on the walls get shabbier the longer they walk, the sound of footsteps multiplying and echoing through the halls. Finally, they approach an empty cell and Beca finds herself literally behind bars, watching the door slide shut with the same deafening bang that she’d seen on TV.

She’d never thought she’d be on the other end.

Officer Alexander grips the bars in both hands as he looks at Beca. He doesn’t look angry so much as tired- it’s late night or early morning, and her own eyelids are starting to droop. She’s been awake for nearly twenty-four hours.

“It’s late and no one is here yet, so I’m going to let everyone rest for a few more hours. You’ll get your lawyer in a couple of days, but really, consider working with us. It’s the only reprieve you’re likely to get.”

Then he leaves, and Beca is left alone, sitting on a cot against one side of her cell. She sits against the wall rather than the stiff mattress- enough stories made it out from inside the system that she knows the condition of the bed. The darkness is almost comforting

For the first time since she got arrested, she thinks of Jesse and Benji. For all she knew, they’d escaped safely to Barden Avenue at least, if not deeper into the city. If they made it that far and got rid the car, no cop was going to catch them in a million years.

All she can do now is wait.

 

*

 

Suddenly, a rattle comes from the cell across from her and she stops mid-doze, looking through the bars with terror clawing at her throat.

“Pstt! Hey!”

Beca’s body instantly tenses and her ears prick, alert to every movement and sound around her. Jumping off the cot, she makes her way to the bars and crouches down, peering through the gaps to catch a glimpse of the voice’s owner. Through the darkness she can vaguely see the outline of a hand waving frantically, a smile, and enough hair to tell her it’s probably a girl. She taps her own bar experimentally, waving back to the stranger.

“Can you see me?”

“Yeah, I can. Who are you?”

“I’m Janice . And you’re Beca.”

Beca recoils from the steel bars. “How did you-“

“Relax, relax, I’m not here to rat you out. Patricia’s told me all about you, you’re practically a legend around Barden. Stealing from the rich and giving to the poor, and all that. Practically keeping the entire neighborhood afloat at this point.”

“Patricia?”

Janice snaps her fingers.

“Oh crap, sorry, I forgot that she’s living as Fat Amy now. Kind of weird, if you ask me. But that’s family.”

Beca smiles for the first time since her arrest, legs crossed and knees just touching the prison bars.

“Yeah, that’s family. What did you do to get yourself in here?”

Janice laughs.

“Oh, some drunk bastard made a pass at me outside of a bar and I took a swing at him. Knocked two of his teeth out before they got me off. I might have taken it too far, but you can’t stop the kraken once its been unleashed. I probably won’t be here long.”

They fall into an easy silence, but the moment of calm bleeds the last energy out of Beca’s body and she slumps back.

“Listen, Janice, if you get out before I do, can you tell everyone that I’m fine? Just say not to worry and I’ll be out soon, and don’t visit. They’re still looking for…some people I was with.”

“Sure. Listen, the officers really aren’t that bad here, not like the women’s prison downtown. Shit may seem bad now, but hang on. You’ve got our help whenever you need it, of anyone at Barden. You’re a hero to us. Just say the word and we’ll be there.”

“Hey, what’s going on here? No talking!” Someone yells from down the hall, rattling a baton down the bars.

By the time the flashlight has reached them, Beca has climbed back onto her cot and has abandoned all cleanliness by lying back on the stained pillow; Janice has retreated into her cell, out of sight. She folds her hands across her lap and stares up at the ceiling, muscles slowly unknotting from their tense formation as she allows sleep to slowly overtake her. As desperate as her situation is, she feels a rush of hope that things might not be as bad as she expected.

 

*

 

Morning comes far too fast for her liking.

 “All right then, get up!”

Beca nearly falls off her cot at the cry, yanked unceremoniously out of her dream Disoriented, she stares at another officer. The entire night settles back on her shoulders, heavier and sharper than before.

Janice is already gone.

As she’s led out of the cell and back into the fluorescent lights, but her first stop isn’t the interrogation room as expected. Instead, she’s lead to the front office, where the same officer seems to be on shift. Looking more haggard and bored than the night before, he presses an ancient phone to her hands and hits a button. A green light flickers on.

“You get one phone call. Make it count.”

Beca hesitates for a moment before picking up the receiver.

“Hello?”

“Hey, dad, it’s Beca.”

 

*

 

“Rebecca, it’s three in the morning here. What on God’s green earth are you doing?”

“I got arrested.”

There is silence on the other line; if the green light wasn’t still on, Beca would have thought that her father had hung up on.  She presses on, her hurried murmur filling up her own ears.

“My bail hearing is probably going to be today, at the police station. They’re getting me a lawyer since I can’t afford one, so I think I’ll be all set.”

Still no answer.

Beca, the first taste of anger rising in her blood, grips the phone so hard in her hands that the plastic creaks against her ear. Her

“Can you say something? Anything? Can you even talk anymore?”

He draws a long, slow breath and the phone crackles with static.

“Why did you call me?”

The breath stills in Beca’s lungs.

“What are you talking about? You’re my dad.”

“And you’re a grown adult who can make your own choices. I told you this would happen, Beca. You just had to go and get mixed up in the wrong crowd, that awful Cynthia girl and God knows who else. If you had just done what I told you to and stopped being so selfish, you wouldn’t be in this position right now. You ruined any kind of relationship you had with me a long time ago.”

“Don’t you dare pin our relationship on me.” Beca snarls. “I was twelve fucking years old, dad. You want to talk about ruining a relationship, try abandoning your wife and kid for a woman you’ve known for two fucking months.”

“You’re twenty-five years old, Rebecca. Whatever I might have done back then was no use; all you did was push me and everyone else away. We’ve been over all this already. I regret what happened to your mother-“

“Don’t you dare fucking talk about her-“

“Fine. I regret what happened with you, but this isn’t my responsibility anymore. I refuse to be a part of your law-breaking antics and I won’t be paying any sort of bail for you until you’ve learned your lesson. Maybe some time in jail would send you along the correct path if I can’t do it with years of support and patience. Please don’t call me again unless you’re willing to reconsider an apology to me and Sheila.”

Beca imagines, for a split second, the imposing, confident image of a man that had always been reserved for her father. The brilliant college professor sitting in his study, laughing when little Beca had clambered into his lap with a toy and demanded to know what he was doing. She’d always have to lift her head to look up at him, a picturesque father figure in her life, like a god on a pedestal.

But she can’t see him now; hasn’t seen him in years, and thought about him less and less as their contact dwindled. Now the image in her head doesn’t look like anything like the hero she remembered so well.

Now, he just looks like a sad old man holding a telephone.

 “Don’t worry. I won’t be calling you anymore.”

“Beca, don’t be immature-“

It shouldn’t be this easy to cut a parent out of your life. It shouldn’t be this easy to box up years of birthdays and school lunches and bruised knees and light it on fire. But most of Beca’s boxes are empty of anything resembling a father, and she strikes the match with no hesitation.

“By the way, you know how they say a parent’s love is unconditional?”

She doesn’t even wait for him to answer.

“Well, guess what. Yours fucking isn’t.”

Beca hangs up and angrily scrubs the tears from her eyes.

“I suppose he didn’t take it well.”

 “No, he- just no.”

“Anyone else, then?”

It suddenly occurs to her that no, there’s no one else to call. There’s no one she can turn to anymore, not Cynthia Rose, not Jesse, not anyone. She got herself into this mess and now she has to get herself out. She has to protect the people that she loves.

“No one else. Just me.”

“Hmm. Well, we’re still searching for your prints in the database. Could save us a lot of time and trouble if you decided to cooperate with us this morning.”

Beca shakes her head.

Tom beckons over another officer. Taking Beca by the arm, he gently but firmly ushers her into the interrogation room.

“Fine. Have it your way.”

 

*

 

Chloe arrives at the police station in record time, pushing her squad car into high gear and parking haphazardly across two spots. She flashes her badge and bolts through the double doors, catching the sight of Tom rounding the corner.

“Tom! What’s wrong, what’s happened?” She demands.

The look in his eyes is almost fearful, when he looks at her, and she lets go of his arm, muttering an apology. Tom is tired, she can tell, and when he holds his hands up she sees a shadowy figure behind the patterned glass of the interrogation room.

“Hey, hey, chill. There’s a woman we picked up last night for stealing from the Anderson place, but she won’t talk to us. We don’t even know her name.”

“That’s all you dragged me here for? Tom, I have to go to Det. Michaels’ crime scene with Aubrey today, remember? I don’t have time to chase every person you pick up for robbery in this city, hand it over to someone else.

She turns to walk away, just as Tom reaches for her shoulder and spins her around gently.

“Hey, just hear me out, okay? She had accomplices, rough looking guys. They were driving a car without a license plate, robbing Anderson blind. I pulled the records of all the unsolved robberies at the station and some of them have seen a person of her size and build running away from the scene. We’re talking a major criminal here. And even if she isn’t involved, she could know something- you know how these neighborhoods are.  It’s not like you have much to go on, if Michaels’ crime scene is like the others we’ve seen.”

“Thanks a lot for reminding me.”

Chloe glares at him, crossing her arms over her chest. Tom seems to realize what he’s said at the same time that Chloe glances back towards the person in the interrogation room.

Whoever it is, they’re awfully small.

Tom, meanwhile, is apologizing, until Chloe clears her throat and waves his apology away.

“No, you’re right, you’re right. Thanks for doing this, I’ll see what I can get out of her.”

Tom hands her the police file and sweeps her arm out towards the interrogation room door.

“She’s all yours.”

Chloe takes a deep breath and walks with practiced calmness towards the room, her face steeling against what she knows is coming. Interrogations were never fun, especially with uncooperative criminals, but years of experience armed her with the correct knowledge. She buttons the top button on her uniform, shakes the tenseness out of her shoulders, and paints a cold smirk on her face. Cool as a cucumber and infinitely more deadly.

She tucks the folder under her arm and reaches out for the door, pulling it open.

 

*

 

At least it’s more comfortable than a cell.

Beca taps her fingers anxiously on the wooden table, chewing on the side of her lip. She doesn’t quite know what they’re trying to accomplish by putting her in here. She’s already committed to staying silent, they’ll run her fingerprints eventually and it’ll be over. Judge, jury, executioner.

Then the door swings open.

_Fuck._

Red hair, blue eyes-

_Fuckfuckfuck-_

A shiny badge on her hip, just where Beca remembered it, but this time she’s cruel and imposing in a stiff police uniform, the blankest look on her face-

It’s _her._

Beca doesn’t move, can’t move as her hands clench into fists. It’s like a movie, the look on her cop’s face. Each scene morphs into the next, battling for dominion over the woman’s features, from shock to happiness to hurt, then settling on anger. Underneath everything, Beca sees something that makes her want to crawl under the table and curl up into a ball.

Betrayal.

“Hello.”

She recognizes her. Beca’s not surprised. The surge of emotion that she had felt was too strong to be unreciprocated. But now she knows it wasn’t intrigue or curiosity or lust that drew the two of them together; it was calculation. A cat and a mouse, locked in the same room together, natural enemies.

Anyone can tell you: the cat always wins.

“Hi.”

She stares at her badge- Detective Chloe Beale, 3rd Precinct- and waits.

 

*

 

Chloe is stunned.

The door handle is still clutched in her hand, she looks across the table and sees her mystery woman looking right back. It’s almost perfect, the resemblance from the restaurant; the hair, the eyeliner, the pierced ears. She’s just as beautiful too, despite tired eyes and a defeated posture, hair matted and tangled. Chloe’s disbelief robs her of all rational thought, so much so that her first instinct is to smile, to grab the woman’s hand and introduce herself properly.

But then she realizes who she’s dealing with, and the thought feels like a punch to the gut. It wipes the smile right off her face.

A criminal. The woman of her dreams is a freaking criminal, busted for theft on a massive scale. This was the woman who’d reeled her in, who made Chloe hope that there was such a thing as love at first sight. The person whom she’d pinned all her expectations on was a thief. Worse than a thief; a fraud.

The hurt blooms into anger, because the woman is making no attempt to make up for what she’s done. She’s just sitting there with no concern to what Chloe is feeling, no idea of the treachery she’s committed.

_Compose yourself, Beale. You’re a cop and she’s the criminal now. Nothing more._

Chloe sits in her own chair and wills her voice not to tremble.

“How old are you, anyway? Eighteen?”

“I’m twenty-five.”

“Hmm. So plenty old enough to know that stealing is wrong, and if you do it you go to prison.”

The woman’s jaw tightens visibly.

“Don’t patronize me.”

Chloe looks into the blue eyes, a shade lighter and many shades angrier than her own, and sees her mistake instantly. This woman, whoever she is- she isn’t a child, not even close. Her training has taught her to look for weakness and exploit it, but as Chloe moves an imperceptible centimeter forwards, she can’t find any. None. The woman stares back defiantly, and despite everything Chloe still wants to just reach over and touch her.

“Well,” she says, flustered, drawing back from the table. In an effort to save face she grabs for the police folder, clearing her throat as her eyes scan the evidence before her.

“You stole from Congressman Anderson, caught red-handed. Witness reports from three other robberies in the greater metropolitan area probably match you as well. Right now you’re looking at several years in prison and fines in excess of fifty thousand dollars. Are you aware of that?”

“Yes.”

“And you still wish to be defiant.”

“Whatever you say, sweetheart. Can I go now?”

Now it’s Chloe’s turn to get angry, and she almost thanks the woman for giving her an excuse to yell.

“I advise you to show a little respect. You’re not in any position to be wisecracking.”

Beca falls silent.

Chloe breathes.

“Anyway, I’m not here to deal with your robbery charges. The law will take care of that. But I have a few questions for you about some crimes that were committed a while ago. You help us, you might get a reduced sentence.”

She slides open her own notes and watches the woman’s face for any trace of emotion.

“John Morrison. Barbara Owen. Kelly Zhang. Christine O’Reilly. Ring a bell?”

No sign of recognition.

“I don’t know them.”

“They were all killed in neighborhoods downtown. High Street, the Harmonics, B-Sharp Apartments. Do you remember being among those streets at all?”

“What, you think I killed them? Me?”

“You are not a suspect at this point in time. What I want to know is if you’ve heard or seen anything out of the ordinary in your…travels. Or if any of your accomplices might have information.”

“No, I don’t know anything. And I don’t associate myself with murderers.”

Chloe mumbles under her breath. “Could’ve fooled me.”

 “Excuse me?”

“I don’t think someone who regularly associates with thieves can pass judgment on what their friends might do. I wouldn’t put anything past you, not even murder. We’ll be keeping an eye on you.”

The woman’s face is outraged.

“What the fuck does that mean?”

By now Chloe is too annoyed to consider the consequences of her words. She hurls them like daggers at the woman across from her, determined to hurt her as much as she could.

 “You’re never going to be anything but a thief, are you? You’re going to jail now, but whenever you get out, you’ll go right back to the same patterns. Well, I’m not going to let that happen. And if I find out you had anything to do with this case, you and the rest of your friends are going to pay dearly.

Betrayal.

 

*

 

It makes sense, Beca thinks, that every good thing in her life had to be ruined, somehow. It didn’t matter. It’s all welling up now, and she can’t run away from it like she does from the scene of a robbery. All she can do is stand still, face Chloe, and feel herself burn.

And she fucking hates it.

But then Chloe makes a misstep, and Beca jumps out of her chair so fast she almost gets whiplash.

“Who do you think you are, barging in here and acting like you have any right to judge me? You don’t know jack shit about my life. You’re not fucking better than me just because you wear that uniform!”

Chloe’s eyes flash and she slams her hands down on the table.

“I don’t steal from people, crawling around in the dark like a rat. I’m pretty sure that makes me a better person than you.”

“You don’t fucking know me. You don’t give a shit about us.” Beca roars back, feeling a sick satisfaction at seeing the redhead physically flinch at her words. It hurts but it feels so fucking good to release the guilt that she pushes harder, twists the knife deeper, waving goodbye to her own freedom with each word. Deep down she still feels it, the spark that Chloe left burning in her when they’d first met.

Well, screw that. She never had a fucking chance anyway.

“Us, huh? What, the criminals and the junkies? Let me tell you, you have no idea the pain you all have caused in this city. I don’t know what bullshit philosophy drives you to steal from people, but that’s exactly what it is- bullshit.”

“Really? You think you’re the one doing good here?”

“I have no freaking doubt in my mind.”

“If you’re such a fucking good cop, how come you can’t keep my neighbors from being robbed every fucking night? How come you can’t keep people from being extorted at every neighborhood in the city? How come you can’t keep these people from getting killed? If we’re talking criminals here, you’re just as responsible as I am. You’re the one who killed them. You're looking for your murderer? Better look in the mirror, Chloe.”

Chloe stops dead in her tracks and if ever there was a line not to cross, Beca knows she’s crossed it.

“I-“

Her entire conscience screams at her to apologize, a part of her that knows what words can do a person. Worse, she’s done it to the one person she might have cared about. But there’s no way to stop Chloe, who looks stricken and wounded and everything Beca tries to heal in other people, from turning on her heel and leaving the room.

“Wait, I’m sorry-“

The girl who felt the need to protect everyone stares at the retreating back of the girl who couldn’t protect anyone.

There are no winners here.

And fuck, Beca’s to blame.

 

*

 

Tom runs to her almost immediately, takes a look at her face and reaches for her. But Chloe’s moving too fast to he just ends up grasping at empty air as she marches quickly towards the station’s exit.

“Chloe? What happened?”

“She’s just a thief, Tom, she doesn’t know anything. Put her away.” She turns and yells back, hating how thick and jumbled with a hint of tears her voice became as she strode away from the woman and everything she wanted to avoid. Chloe thanks the Lord that it’s still early and practically no one is around to see her as she leaves.

Aubrey is outside the police station already, her badge and gun firmly secured to her hip. It’s pointless to hide anything from her, like trying to hide a seal from a shark, but when Aubrey starts to question her she mutters something about “letting Tom down easy” and that she doesn’t want to talk about it. Aubrey is nothing if not perceptive, and she lets Chloe into the passenger’s side door without  further comment.

“Are you okay to go to the crime scene today?”

Chloe looks out the window and sees the corkboard of victims in her office, the heavy case file, the endless hours of sifting through pieces and the pain she’s seen and suffered. More than anything she’s desperate to change something, to prove her mystery woman wrong. To hell with love, she has a job to do.

“I’m fine. Just drive.”

Aubrey peels out of the driveway and down the road.

 


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here we go again, you guys. Thanks always for reading.  
> TW: Discussion of murder.

By the time they reach the main road, Chloe’s hands have stopped shaking and the nausea in her stomach has settled into a numbness that creeps back up each time Aubrey runs over a pothole or turns a corner too sharply. She hasn’t recovered enough to properly feel her fingers or toes so she focuses on the light streaming through her window. Morning has definitely arrived, and the city is yawning, stretching, waking up, the streets filling with more people each block they drive through. Their police radio crackles with status updates and traffic reports, thankfully eliminating the need for talking, but Chloe is willing to trade any amount of awkward conversation for her thoughts to stop ping-ponging around her brain.

_You’re the one who killed them._

The lump in her throat grows with each second…

_Murderer._

…until it cuts off her airway and Chloe half-chokes, half sobs, making Aubrey snap her head towards her.

_You’re responsible._

Chloe bites down hard enough on her lip to taste blood on her tongue.

They’re in the rougher part of the city, now, and colorful graffiti is splattered across the brick walls of the tenements and apartment complexes. They pass broken streetlamps and Chloe watches the sun reflect off the glass and into her mirror. Here, a cop car in mid-morning rather than at night is somewhat of an anomaly, and Chloe watches the shopkeepers look out through their storefronts to peer at them in confusion. A few children stop their play to gape.  The world is eerily still to her as she looks out into it, like the settling calm after a dissipated tornado, and sometime soon, she knows, she’s going to have to come out of the storm cellar and assess the damage.

Her badge settles heavily on her shoulder and her gun even heavier on her hip.

Aubrey clears her throat, idly tapping her fingers on the steering wheel as they wait for the light to change. A woman walking across the street glances directly at Chloe and looks away quickly, gripping her handbag in both hands and redoubling her pace before disappearing into an alley. Aubrey is watching her, too, with suspicion in her gaze, and Chloe resists the urge to disregard all traffic rules and turn an abrupt left at the red. As if reading her thoughts, Aubrey suddenly looks towards her and opens her mouth to speak.

Chloe wonders if the guilt shows on her face.

“So.....do you want to talk about him?” Aubrey asks, undoubtedly watching Chloe shuffle restlessly in her seat. Chloe is confused for a brief moment before realizing that her best friend is talking about Tom, sweet, stupid Tom, who had simultaneously granted her most fervent wish and broken her spirit by bringing that woman back into Chloe’s life.

_You killed them._

Tears still sting a little at Chloe’s eyes and she delicately flicks them away like so many particles of dust. Her throat aches to tell Aubrey, to break down and confess every thought that fought to keep itself contained in her mind, that everything was going to shit and it all was getting to be too much for her. That even Det. Chloe Beale, raised of patience and persistence and Aubrey’s long-suffering rock, had her limits. But her realistic side wins out, because Aubrey is still her best friend, a friend that is too headstrong and stubborn and too much of a cop to ever sympathize with Chloe’s plight. So she swallows and fakes a small smile.

“I’m fine. Really I am, the date just didn’t work out the way I wanted it to. I thought we had a lot more in common than we actually did, or else I would never have agreed to it. Guess I was wrong.”

Aubrey cranes her neck to the left, chewing on her lip as she steers the car into the street. The police station rises high and intimidating down the street as they slow.

"What, does he have an inner jerk I don’t know about? I mean, you and I both know his record is almost squeaky clean, not so much as a traffic ticket since he became a cop. And you’ve worked with him on this case for months, I don’t know, does he have a creepy stalker side I never noticed before now?”

“Nah, it’s nothing like that. He tried hard enough. I think it was my fault, actually, I’m a little too- preoccupied with anything to be anyone’s girlfriend right now. I just hope things will be alright between us after this.”

Aubrey hums as she parks the car and Chloe can unclench her fingers from their place on her lap, heaving a sigh as Aubrey pulls the key from the ignition. For a moment they just sit in silence, mentally preparing themselves for the task before them. She can practically see Aubrey stiffen into City Commissioner Posen like someone’s injected her with concrete, and sets her own face into stone as they open their doors in unison and walk towards the entrance.

Aubrey looks at her, letting their hands briefly touch. Chloe looks at her, searching for confidence.

“This could be the breakthrough we’re looking for. Let’s go get whatever bastard is behind this, and tear him limb from limb.”

Chloe smiles for the first time in hours.

 

*

 

Det. Michaels is sitting in his office when Aubrey taps on his desk. He removes his glasses with a flourish, and Chloe sees the exhaustion seep into his eyes before it’s gone, masked by a stern pleasantry.

“Posen, Beale. I’m sorry we had to meet on such circumstances, but I imagine you’re as eager as I am to get this thing solved.”

“Of course.”

They shake his hand in turn and he presents them with security passes and a thick case file each. Aubrey looks positively elated, while Chloe only presses them to her chest and gives him a nod of thanks.

“Most of the files here you already know about, but there are a few descriptions and reports of the evidence found at the scene. You’ll be able to see them after you visit the morgue.”

Chloe leans forward and takes the card from his hand, placing another form on his desk.   “We’ll need access to the crime scene, both of us. Re-canvassing. You know the procedure.”

Michaels nods grimly, signing the document and tucking the pen back into his pocket. There’s no need for too much conversation- they all know what’s at stake here, and the consequences of failure.

“Stevenson will take you to the morgue, and then to the crime scene. Good luck.”

 

*

 

Chloe had only been to the morgue twice before she’d taken on this case, and had hated every second of her trips. This trip, on the other hand, is her sixth in as many months, Chloe notes soberly as she walks beside Aubrey and the morgue attendant, swinging open the thick steel doors. Unnaturally white light bathes them as they proceed into the identification room, and it all smacks Chloe in the face again as she watched the steel tray slide smoothly away from the wall to reveal the body.

The stench of formaldehyde, the cold sterile gloves, the sight of family members breaking into sobs and falling to their knees in desperation- it never got easier, and Chloe has to fight to keep herself from gagging as they heft the dead woman onto the table.

“Christine O’Reilly.” Aubrey murmurs, flipping through papers before pinning one to the lightbox. Quickly Chloe sets to work. The body is ice-cold and paler than the sheet she was wrapped in, the body  stiff with rigor mortis having set in not long after the death. Chloe begins the process of combing over the body for any clue, no matter how small. Aubrey pulls on a pair of surgical gloves and hands another pair to Chloe, peeling back more of the sheet.

“No signs of strangulation or any sort of torture wound, no burns or bruises. The rape kit came back clean as well?”

“Yeah. No signs of forced entry into the home, either, or any valuables taken. So it wasn’t a robbery for any large amount of money. No track marks or signs of drug abuse. Someone definitely killed her for a reason.”

Aubrey opens the woman’s mouth and inspects it, jotting down notes on a legal pad during the process. Chloe hates that the world “robbery” makes her hands tremble more than they should, and covers by pushing an errant lock of hair away from the dead woman’s face.

 “You’re probably right. Just the one bullet to the head. Went in smoothly, exited smoothly. She didn’t feel a thing.”

They work for an hour more, and with each test that comes up clean Chloe gets more and more convinced that they have another victim on their hands. Soon the body has been out for too long to be safe and together they lift it carefully back into its storage container. With Christine O’Reilly gone, Chloe and Aubrey simple stand on opposite sides of the table, staring at each other. Chloe swallows and speaks first.

“One ear missing-“

“-and the hands crossed across the chest.”

“Just like the others.” She whispers, taking back her sheaf of papers and shoving them under her arm. Goosebumps run up and down her arms that have nothing to do with the cold. Aubrey only disposes of her gloves with calm efficiency, nodding at the attendant.

“We’re done here. Could you please show us the way to the crime scene? Oh, and tell the family they can take the body for burial now.”

Stevenson- who looks green around the gills and all too eager to leave the morgue himself, leads them out.

The crime scene isn’t much better, when they get there. Their squad car is silenced and disguised, and Chloe’s badge is tucked away inside her jacket to avoid causing any sort of stir. It’s noon and the sun is beginning to bake them both in the tin can of the car, so ducking into the cool, shady warehouse is almost a relief.

“They’ve already combed over this place, I doubt we’ll find anything new.” Aubrey mutters, following Chloe’s footsteps so closely that Chloe’s sure only one set of footprints marred the dust-covered floor. Cracked and peeling paint halfheartedly cover the walls; there are holes the size of golf carts in the ceiling. Coming to the scene of the crime, Chloe crouches carefully amidst the dust.

“This is where they found the body?”

 Aubrey pushes her sunglasses back to the top of her head.

“Yeah, this is it. The rain from a few days back washed away the chalk marks, but this is it. Forensics removed a few papers and furniture, but there were no fingerprints on any of the material. It looks like this was just your regular abandoned structure, co-opted for some other purpose. No one lived here, that’s for sure.”

Chloe hmms and takes slow, careful steps around the perimeter; it unsettles her to step where Christine O’Reilly’s body had been. She scans the whole room, top to bottom, before moving onto a small office attached to the main room. _No gaping roof in this one, but no electricity either_ , Chloe thinks, before switching on the police-issue flashlight at her hip. Scanning the walls reveals nothing out of the ordinary; just a pile of two-by-fours and some insulation, and she’s about to head out when she happens to flick her flashlight to her upper left.

And freezes.

 

*

“Aubrey!”

She hears rather than sees her best friend come running, from the thunk of her shoes against the concrete. A shower of dust accompanies Aubrey’s appearance as she slides to a stop, a quizzical look on her face.

“Look at this.”

Chloe tilts her flashlight up.

“What the hell?” Aubrey breathes.

Lines. Long, straight white lines carved into the concrete wall, some two dozen all arranged systematically in neat rows. Chloe’s eyes dash from one to the next- some lines strike through crude circles, and others are unmarked. One in particular catches her attention- a five pointed star, pushed deeper into the wall than the others. There's no blood, no sign of violence- but the sight still sends shivers up Chloe's spine.

“Michaels didn’t take pictures of this?” Aubrey hisses in anger. “What, did he think that some murderer’s knife marks in the wall didn’t constitute some sort of emergency? I swear to God-“

“No, no, I don’t think they came from a knife fight or anything like that, look at how neat it is. “ Chloe breaks in, adjusting her grip on the light. “A ritual carving? Five pointed star- maybe it’s Satanic.”

“I don’t see any crosses or even real symbols here. Look, the lines don’t seem to be part of any recognizable pattern. They might have just needed to keep count of something. Tallying records on the walls.”

Chloe shakes her head imperceptibly. Something is here, she knows it, she feels it gnawing at her but she can’t pinpoint what it is. The pattern of the lines- it nags incessantly at her memory, trying to dredge up something crucially important and forgotten from view. Aubrey moves to bathe the rest of the walls in light but Chloe remains standing there, peering at the wall with her head cocked in concentration.

Suddenly, a realization flows through her like bone-cold, rushing water and she reaches for Aubrey so suddenly that Aubrey winces in pain, yanking her arm away.

“Chloe? What the-what is it?”

“Streets. The lines, Aubrey- they’re the goddamned city streets.”

 

*

 

“Knew there’d be a use for this map someday.”

Aubrey tucks her tongue between her teeth as she fumbles with the paper map, sliding it below the drawing as Chloe takes rapid pictures behind her. Once secured, Chloe sets the camera down and uncaps a red Sharpie, pushing strands of sweat-soaked hair away from her face. She knew she'd seen the pattern before, navigating through the city before GPS was installed ont their vehicles, and Chloe sends up a silent prayer in thanks.

She crouches beside Aubrey’s map and traces it with shaking fingers, excitement and panic churning in equal parts in her stomach.

“Okay, okay. I’m marking the ones that are circled as “interest” streets. Fifth Avenue, Twelfth Avenue, Eighteenth-. Alright, those match up. Okay, High Street, B-Sharp-“

As more and more streets on the map are filled in with red, Chloe feels a rush of elation so strong it can only be called a high- wave after wave of satisfaction floods her as she matches her victims to the circled streets, each puzzle piece sliding into proper order and clicking into place. Aubrey looks on with the same buzzing excitement, calling out names more quickly than Chloe can read them.

“That’s it. Okay, all the circled lines are definitely areas where the bodies were found- there’s no doubt that this isn’t coincidence. But what about the star?”

“So assuming that the starred line is some sort of target, that puts us at-“

Chloe traces the name with a finger.

“Barden Avenue.”

“That’s it. That’s where they’ll hit next.”

The last syllable hasn’t left Chloe’s lips before Aubrey has turned her heel and is headed back to the car, Chloe dashing to the passenger side with equal urgency. As Aubrey guns the motor, Chloe yanks the radio out of the dashboard and sends out a message.

“Michaels? Yeah, listen, we have a code red here. I need backup and a list of all the homeowners or tenants that live on Barden Avenue. Place a call with Tom back at base. We’re headed to Barden right now, meet us there. Over.”

*

They reach Barden Avenue at about the same time that Tom and the force arrive as well. A crowd has already gathered to gawk and point at the medley of officers suddenly crowding the street, and several of Chloe's colleagues are ushering the people back into their homes. Aubrey glances at the crowd and pins her Commissioners' badge to her lapel before walking up to the first complex on the street. Chloe follows, glanding at the list of names she holds in her hand before ringing the doorbell.

“Beca? Is that you?” Someone calls from inside.

“This is the police, please open the door!” Aubrey calls, knocking her fist against the door. There is a pause on the other end before the door swings open. The woman on the other side cradles a child in her arms before glaring at Chloe with wide, frightened eyes. “Can I help you?”

“Are you Cynthia Rose Adams?”

After some hesitation, the woman nods.

“Hello, ma’am. We’re from the city police force, here to inform you that this neighborhood is on official watch as if one o’clock this afternoon. Please be careful for the next week or so, until we update you on the situation. If you need more information, please call this number and we’ll be happy to help. Have a nice day.”

Aubrey hands over a police bulletin explaining the situation and says a brief goodbye before quickly jogging down the driveway to the next house. Chloe remains rooted on the step, her eyes frozen to some point beyond the woman’s shoulder.

“Excuse me? Is there a problem, officer?”

Without looking at her, Chloe absently picks up a picture frame on the small hall table. It’s a party of some sort, Fourth of July judging from the decorations in the background. Maybe ten people are crammed into the photo, smiling and covered with water But what’s grabbed her attention is the person crouched dead center, a brilliant smile on her face.

Because it’s _her._ The woman at the police station, the burglar, the woman Chloe inevitably found herself enraptured by. Her smile is as perfect as Chloe imagined that it would be, but her happiness at finding her again is instantly clouded by the looming danger that Chloe felt with every moment she stayed in Barden Avenue. The thought strikes her so suddenly that she almost drops the picture, correcting herself at the last second to peer into the woman’s face again. Chloe knows that it means; her mystery woman is intimately connected to someone living in Barden, which means she’s also in danger. Perhaps in even more danger than anyone, if she knew something and Chloe’s murderer thought she was squealing to the police. Maybe someone had deliberately set her up to take the fall for the higher-ups that night at the Anderson house. Maybe-

Maybe the mystery woman was the person Chloe, deep down, hoped and prayed she was. Maybe she was the key to everything.

The possibility of her innocence ignites Chloe’s blood once again and she spins around, holding up the frame like a shield against the violence that she knows is inevitably coming.

“Hey, what are you doing-“

As if on cue, the baby starts to bawl just as Chloe opens her mouth.

“Mrs. Adams? I need you to tell me who this woman is.”

Cynthia Rose remains silent, rocking the baby on her shoulder, but Chloe can see the confusion in her eyes. She’s all too familiar with it; it’s probably reflected in her own.

“Mrs. Adams!”

“You can’t come in here without a warrant. I have my rights.”

Cynthia Rose, even with a baby in her arms, stares Chloe down in the middle of the entryway, her hand on the doorknob. Chloe looks wildly about, making sure Aubrey isn’t in the room, before lowering her voice and pleading with the woman in a low, desperate whisper.

“Listen, I know what you’re trying to protect. I know who that woman is, she was picked up last night for robbery, I talked to her this morning and I know that she’s a good person who cares about all of you. But I’m also the head of a multiple-homicide investigation, possibly a serial killer, who is targeting people in this neighborhood. I need more information, and for that, I need you to tell me her name. For you, for her, for everyone on this street and in this city. Please.”

There is no change in Cynthia Rose’s face or expression, only another gesture to get out of the house, and Chloe hangs her head for a moment in defeat before storming out. Before she’s gone halfway across the pavement, however, she hears Cynthia Rose call out after her.

“Her name is Rebecca Mitchell. Beca for short.”

Chloe releases her breath in one long exhale before running back up to the house and grasping Cynthia Rose’s hands in her own.  

_Beca Mitchell._

“Thank you.”

“She’s a good person.” Cynthia Rose blurts out. “She’s my best friend and she protects us, all of us. Never takes a handout, always puts us before her own comfort. I hope you know anyone in this street would do anything to help her.”

Chloe looks at her and sees the sincerity- and the warning- behind her words.

“I understand.”

And then she’s gone, passing by Aubrey as her best friend puts a police squad into their positions at the street corner.

“I want double patrols around this area, one squad car here at all times-Chloe? Where are you going?”

Chloe almost doesn’t hear her through the pounding blood in her ears, as a plan begins to take shape in her mind. She stops and presses her hands onto the roof of the car, closing her eyes to block out the glare of the sun and Aubrey’s yelling. _Calculate, Beale_. Yes, yes, this plan would work. It was going to work.

It had to.

“I’m going back to the police station. There’s something I have to take care of.”

 

*

It has not been a good day for Beca.

After her run-in with Chloe, Tom had turned on Beca in anger for upsetting her.

She’s not been formally arrested yet- refusing to give up her name and being born in another state really slowed down the judicial process- so they threw her back into the cell she’d spent the night in. Once they’d opened her door to let her into the bathroom and twice to deliver food, but for the most part she’s left alone with her thoughts, incessantly replaying her conversation with Chloe in the interrogation room.

Fuck.

Beca watches her guard light up in front of the No Smoking sign, waving the smoke through an open window. The end of the cigarette flares briefly, ash crumbling to the floor as Beca watches him puff, suddenly craving a distraction of her own. Anything to help her stop thinking.

Crash!

Startled, the guard nearly falls out of his chair, wobbling on two legs before grabbing the wall with a curse. The cigarette tumbles onto his shoes and Beca slaps a hand over her mouth to keep from laughing as he hops from foot to foot trying to get it off. Someone is running towards them, sliding haphazardly across the linoleum, when the guard gives up all hope and stands to attention, the cigarette still smoldering at his feet.

“Is she still here?”

Beca knows that voice, has it memorized even though she’s only heard it for a few minutes, and she freezes with her mouth wide open as Det. Chloe Beale comes storming up to her cell, grabbing hold of the bars and pressing her face against the metal to stare, it seems, right into Beca’s soul. Something crazed and frantic has gripped her for sure, and before Beca can apologize or even think clearly, Chloe speaks.

“You’re Rebecca Mitchell. Your name is Rebecca Mitchell but everyone calls you Beca, especially Cynthia Rose.”

Beca is stunned into silence so Chloe continues on, her words spilling out of her mouth like they’re on fire. She looks as deeply as she can into Beca’s eyes- light blue, beautiful eyes- and prays that she can get her message across.

“Everyone and anyone who lives in Barden Avenue is in danger right now, Beca, and I need your help. A serial murderer is loose in this city right now- I don’t have to tell you what’s at stake here, but whoever the sick bastard is, he’s coming for the people at Barden. I know you love those people, and I know you’d do anything to help them. So for Christ’s sake, please, _please_ tell me if you know anything about what’s happening here.”

Something between a whimper and a cry escapes Beca’s mouth as she rushes up to Chloe, their faces inches apart. Tears of anger and helplessness sting at the corners of her eyes but she keeps her gaze fixed on Chloe, unable to do anything but babble.

“What, I-I don’t know anything! Cynthia Rose- is she hurt?”

Chloe shakes her head and lets her hands slide down to cover Beca’s. Her soft touch burns warmth into Beca’s skin, calming her pulse and her mind as Chloe squeezes, her only purpose to comfort and protect. Beca won’t, can’t tear her hands away from Chloe’s grasp even if she wanted to, and she lets herself savor the contact and the news that everyone she loves is safe.

“She’s fine, everyone’s fine- for now. But I need you to think, Beca, and I need you to help me.”

“I’ve told you- if I could, I would, but I can’t. I don’t know how to help you! I don’t know anything about your case, or if anyone at Barden- I don’t know what to do.”

Beca’s voice cracks in the middle of the sentence.

“Tell me what to do.”

Chloe holds on for another moment before removing her hands and motioning to the guard with the key to Beca’s cell. It’s a conscious loss, Chloe’s touch, and Beca rubs her arms in an attempt to get the feeling back, to no avail.

“You’ll work with us.”

“Excuse me?”

 

*

 

Chloe’s eyes burn bright with determination as she straightens up. The car ride to the prison had been wracked with indecision, but now that she’s here, in front of Beca, it has never been so obvious.

“You’ll go undercover with us, the police force, to catch this guy. Whatever information we have, you have. Whatever help you need, we’ll provide. We need someone on the inside, who knows this city better than we ever could, who can tell us the hiding spots and teach us the vernacular and report back on any scrap of news that might help us out. You can pick locks, break into houses, escape from every situation- things we need to learn how to do if we’re going to put this guy away. In return, I’m willing to grant you full immunity for this and any previous crime you’ve committed.”

Beca’s mouth is gaping open and suddenly Chloe regrets spilling out so much information at once. But Beca recovers quickly, crossing her arms over her chest and tilting her chin up ever so slightly. The strength she shows would be impressive, if Chloe didn’t know how much Beca had to show on a daily basis. A muscle tenses in Beca’s jaw, tightening and untightening as Chloe watches the decision struggle for resolution in Beca’s head.

“So it’ll be dangerous.”

“Without question.”

“And it might not work.”

“Possibly.”

“But you really think I’m necessary?”

Chloe has never been so sure.

“I think you’re our only hope.”

Beca still doesn’t say anything, chewing quietly on her lip. Chloe sighs and turns away, stopping short of letting the guard unlock Beca’s cell.

“I understand if you need time to think about it.”

Chloe begins to turn away, but Beca lunges and grabs for her shoulder, spinning her around. Chloe turns back to see Beca offering her hand, eyes like blue diamonds set in porcelain.

“You’ve got a deal.


	7. Chapter 7

The gravity of what she’s done doesn’t register until the station guard moves forward to unlock the door and Chloe leads Beca out, her hand tight around Beca’s elbow. Now that she’s free, the jail cell looks even smaller behind her. When they reach the interrogation rooms Beca doesn’t miss how Chloe avoids _that_ one, the one where their first meeting had occurred. When Chloe opens the door to a different room and beckons her to sit, she does so without hesitation.

Chloe locks the door behind them, and just _looks_ at her for a moment, like Beca’s got some secret answer to their dilemma that she hasn’t mentioned yet.

_I think you’re our only hope._

_You’ve got a deal._

Chloe’s jaw tightens as she pulls a pen and some papers out of a crate on the desk, and they both look in separate directions when the words CONFIDENTIAL appear in big red letters across the front; Beca towards the ceiling, Chloe at the floor.

They’re both shaken, and they’re both choosing to ignore it.

Beca has no fucking idea how she’d gotten here.

Or how she’s getting out.

She’s a planner by nature, a thief only by necessity. She doesn’t make impulse decisions, doesn’t let her emotions even approach the boundaries of her mind, let alone control it. Beca’s body recognizes adrenaline and dopamine and endorphins, and it always makes an exception for good old fashioned pain. To hell with the rest of it.

But in the past few days she’s made more impulse decisions than she’s had birthdays. Taking that scumbag Bumper’s job on a whim. Deciding out of the blue to abandon her life of crime. Telling Jesse about said decision, and getting herself in deep shit afterwards. And now agreeing, for Christ sake, to put her trust and her skills and her _fucking_ life with a cop, whose hands are currently shaking as Chloe rolls the cotton ball across the pad of Beca’s finger, taking down the print.

Not that Beca is doing any better; now that some parts of the picture have been cleared up and her freedom secured for the immediate future, her traitorous heart zeroes in on how near Chloe is; how well the uniform hugs her shoulders, how the strands of red hair that fall from her face smell of sunshine and clean sweat, or how the heartbeat in Beca’s wrist quickens when Chloe accidently presses too hard on the veins underneath the skin.

As if the universe hasn’t punished her enough, the ink just has to dry up at that moment and Beca spends another minute wondering if the pink tongue that pokes out of Chloe’s mouth in frustration is as soft as it looks.

It’s unnecessarily overwhelming and Beca suddenly pulls away, snatching her hand back into neutral territory.

Chloe looks up.

_Damnit._

“I need you to hold still, Beca, so I can get the print.”

“Yeah, well, you’re taking a damn long time.” Beca bites back, reluctantly putting her hand back on the table. Chloe only rolls her eyes before pressing the pad of Beca’s pinkie into the ink and onto the paper, before filing it away in a new manila folder.

“Okay, I can take care of most of the paperwork later on, but right now I need to ask you a few questions. Residential information, monetary status, next of kin, any relationships that might affect how you do this job. Do you want a lawyer with you?”

Beca shakes her head, propping her chin on her fist. She knows what she can and can’t say, knowledge whispered through the streets of Barden since before she started her line of work. Plus, lawyers would only complicate an already fucked up situation.

“Is this the speech you give all of your undercover agents?”

Chloe laughs ruefully, uncapping the pen.

“No, everyone else would get a much stricter audit of their past history. Probably a physical examination too, before we even let them through the door. So this…this is only for you.”

Nothing about Chloe changes, so Beca knows she doesn’t really realize what came out of her mouth; but for an instant Beca feels lightheaded with surprise. It’s stupid, to overanalyze like a schoolgirl in such a serious fucking situation, but hearing _only for you_ still makes something shiver up Beca’s spine, even if it’s just an assessment of how good a criminal she is.

“I need to know about the people close to you.”

“There aren’t many. You know Cynthia Rose, some other people who rent at Barden. My dad is a college professor, he remarried ten years ago. I don’t have any siblings or extended family.”  
“What about your mother?”

“I don’t talk about my mother.”

Beca’s voice thins as the room is suddenly fraught with tension. If she reached up she could snap it like elastic.

Chloe clears her throat awkwardly and touches the pen to paper; her hand trembles and mars the white.

“Romantic relationships, then?”

She doesn’t look at Beca while she’s asking.

“Not any that you need to know about. Nothing remotely serious.”

“The police report that a young man was driving your getaway car last night, when you were brought in. You want to tell me about him?”

_Jesse._

“He’s an acquaintance. Like I said: you don’t need to know about him.”

Jesse will be fine. If he hasn’t been found yet, he’s not going to be. That car is either taken apart or at the bottom of the harbor by now, and every possible bit of evidence linking him to it wiped clean.

Chloe’s face darkens and she looks hurt, actually hurt, then the moment’s passed and they’re right back where they started: staring at each other from across the table, the cop and the criminal, across a distance that might as well be a mile wide.

The last of the papers are filled out quickly, one after the other, until Chloe sighs and sets the folder aside, rotating her wrist in small circles.

“That’s it for the preliminary paperwork. Now, before you sign any of this, I should warn you right now that this is a dangerous task you’re taking on. If you have any squeamishness or indecision about your role here, state it now. We’ll of course be protecting you from harm in any way we know how, but I can’t assure you that you won’t be exposed to danger or disturbing situations during your time with us. I showed you the pictures earlier; they get a lot worse in the evidence file we have at station. Are you prepared to analyze those facts and photos with a purely objective mind?”

No.

_Hell_ no.

Beca reminds herself again that she’s actually here, watching Chloe tap her fingers on her police radio,  but she can’t stop seeing the images of the serial’s killer’s victims, dumped and mutilated like so many sacks of meat tumbling into the factory. She can’t stop imagining her own face, limp and alabaster and wide-eyed, soaked in blood.

The face changes to Cynthia Rose’s, to her _child_ ’s, and Beca has to pinch the bridge of her nose to keep from retching.

Chloe must notice, because she unclasps her hands from their steeple to lean over and grasp Beca’s, forcing her back into the present. The concern that shines out of her face is firm and honest, eyes raking Beca over for every twitch of indecision.

“Are you okay?”

“Yeah. Why wouldn’t I be?”

Chloe tilts her head, surprised.

“You just agreed to be part of a sting operation, Miss Mitchell, to catch a possible serial killer with no rhyme or reason to his crimes other than proving a point. And we don’t even know what point. Are you sure you want this? Even with your best efforts we may not be able to get him before he strikes again.”

Beca’s hackles rise despite herself; she makes a move to get out of her chair but Chloe’s already pushed back her own, hands raised.

“Miss Mitchell-“

“Christ- it’s Beca, okay? Beca! And geez, confident much? I thought this was a chance to solve this thing, not a fucking suicide mission. If you’re just using Cynthia Rose to guilt-trip me into risking my life for you and trying me out of the way, I swear-“

It’s fucking relentless, the way they push and pull. One instant she wanted to trust Chloe with everything and felt secure with making that decision, but then there it was again, that inkling that _no,_ Chloe was still Detective Beale and could throw her under a bus soon as look at her. It’s fucking exhausting, and embarrassing, and Beca’s never been good at being heroic.

“Of course not!”  Chloe retorts, standing to match Beca’s stance. She’s added even more to their height difference with the police-issue combat boots and her voice pierces when she’s angry, sharp in a way only borne of desperation. Beca tries to speak again but Chloe cuts off.

“Look, for the first time in months, we have a solid lead on this case and we have an idea of where and when he’s headed. But this isn’t going to work if you keep second-guessing me and my intentions, and doubting that I am actually concerned about the welfare of you and your friends. I don’t know what I have to do to convince you that I’m serious about this, and I’m serious that you need to be part of this operation. And believe it or not, I don’t have any interest in seeing someone else killed on my watch!”

Beca leans forward, combative, and stares into Chloe’s eyes, and it’s the same blue-on-blue that got her into so much trouble in the first place. But Chloe’s wired and beat; dark circles under her eyes betray her lack of sleep, and her shoulders slump with the weight of exhaustion even as Chloe visibly tries to keep a strong demeanor in front of Beca.

But the façade is slipping.  Chloe hadn’t looked like that last night, not when she was clinging to the bars of Beca’s cell and set her alight with hope that there was a common solution to their problems. Not when she grabbed for a chance to protect people.

Chloe’s not lying. At least, not about needing her.

So, a few more tense seconds later, Beca sits back down. Chloe does the same, and the silence stretches and wraps around them both.

“Okay?” Chloe asks.

“Okay.” Beca whispers, and some uneasy truce is established.

 

*

Beca Mitchell is possibly the most infuriating person Chloe’s ever met.

And the most stubborn, and belligerent, and suspicious.

But she’s also the closest thing Chloe has to a clue, and she sits with a strength that doesn’t come from a gun or a guard but from a desire to protect, as relentless as Chloe’s and twice as crafty. As Beca signs the papers without further hesitation Chloe lets herself believe that they’re not so different after all, that barring circumstance their positions would easily have been reversed.

Chloe places the papers back into the evidence crate and claps her palms gently down on the table.

“We need to work out the terms of this deal, and then you can get out of here. Obviously we want to remain as discreet as possible with gaining as much information as we can. So our arrangements need to be tightly coordinated-“

Suddenly, a crash and a rush of yelling voices break the normal still of the police station outside their room and Chloe’s heart sinks when she recognizes the voice.

“-well, tell your boss that I’m Commissioner Aubrey Posen, and that if he doesn’t let me in there immediately I’ll have his badge-“

_Shit._

Beca leaves off tapping the table and glares at the door.

“Who the hell is that?”

“Oh, God-“ Chloe mutters, squeezing her eyes shut as a very angry Aubrey Posen appears and raps a fist against the glass of the interrogation window. She can’t possibly see inside, but Beca jumps up anyway.

“What the fuck?”

“It’s okay, just stay here-“

Chloe rises and heads for the door before Aubrey can break it down.

“Do not leave this room under any circumstances, okay? Let me handle it.”

She slips outside and guards the door as Aubrey advances on her and pins her to it with the fury of her gaze, jabbing her finger in Chloe’s face until they’re inches apart.

“Chloe Beale, are you out of your fucking mind?”

Aubrey doesn’t curse. Aubrey’s never cursed, except for that one time when a new recruit almost pumped a bullet into her on the first day at the shooting range. She doesn’t let “the slang of charlatans and lowlifes” infiltrate her speech.

“Do you have any fucking idea what you’ve done?”

Or maybe she does.

“Aubrey, Aubrey-hear me out, okay? She can help us, she knows these neighborhoods, especially Barden, like the back of her hand. Just give her a chance to talk to us, that’s all I’m asking-“

“You aren’t allowed to ask anything!” Aubrey roars, sending the few other occupants of the hallway running for cover. “You are a subordinate officer who is stepping so far out of line you’re practically in Mexico, and you’re lucky you haven’t been written up-“

Chloe winces as Aubrey goes on, the words like little shards of ice, but all she can really think about is Beca, undoubtedly able to hear them through the door, and how all the progress she’s made about trust and safety are spiraling down the drain with each word that falls out of Aubrey’s mouth.

Something has to give.

“Aubrey, just shut up!”

She stops abruptly.

“I know you think that you know what’s best.”

Aubrey makes some kind of furious squeaking noise.

“This is my case. This is my responsibility. And I’m doing the best I can do, and I think this is our best option. If this doesn’t work out, kick me off. Take my badge. But you owe the people you serve to at least try, regardless of how you feel about it. I need this, Aubrey. I’ve never asked anything of you, but you have to give me this.”

They’re both panting in the terse silence, Chloe from her speech, Aubrey from fury. Suddenly, Aubrey’s cell phone rings, and Chloe recognizes the tone as the line reserved for the mayor himself. Aubrey snatches up the offending object and throws one last furious glare at Chloe before turning on her heel.

“I can’t deal with this right now.” She hisses, and jams the phone back in her pocket.

“We’re not done here, Officer. You’re putting your own neck on the line, not mine, and you better be prepared to accept the consequences.”

She marches down the hallway, officers and prisoners alike parting like the Red Sea, and throws open the double doors at the end of the hall like she’s trying to rip them from their hinges.

Chloe doesn’t dare breathe until she’s out of sight.

 

*

Well, this was a new development.

Beca listens to the fuss with interest at first, then grows more and more impatient as Chloe doesn’t defend herself- or Beca. Her silence in the face of the tirade nearly makes Beca disregard her advice.

A small swell of pride emerges in Beca’s chest as Chloe’s voice breaks into the rant, calculated to shock Aubrey into silence. But it doesn’t seem to have done much good, or had any lasting effect; Chloe’s entire face screams _don’t say anything_ when she re-enters, and Beca settles with raising an impressed eyebrow as Chloe settles back in her chair and tries to pick up where they left off.

The papers rustle for a minute, and then two, before Chloe gives up with a sigh.

“Where were we, again? I’m sorry.”

“Coordination, getting information-?”

“Ah, yes. You need a cover, so here’s your new story.”

Beca leans forward. Chloe’s voice grows stronger with each word.

“Since you’re a first time offender and because of your father’s position, you have not been charged with the crimes you could have been, breaking and entering, felony theft, et cetera. But in return for your freedom, you have to attend re-integration classes at the police station until you complete the course. Eventually, the idea is that we are preparing you for another method of employment. Three hours, ten o’clock every day of the week, with additional time if we require it. We will compensate you for your time.”

Beca nods.

“Sounds good.”

“Okay, then there’s just one more thing.”

Chloe holds up a metal bracelet.

“You’ll have to wear this tracking device from now until we’re done with this sting operation. You’ll probably get it off after a while, though that’s contingent on good behavior. Part of the deal I had to cut, to get you on this case.”

“What, you don’t trust me or something?” Beca deadpans, taking the device from her and examining it. Clunky and obvious, not easily concealable.

“It’s just a precaution.”

“More like a safety hazard, I bet I could break some bones if I kicked someone with this. This thing is like a pound! What am I supposed to do, drag it along everywhere I go?”

“You could also have a metal rod inserted into your arm that would send out an electronic signal every half-hour of your whereabouts. Replaceable every three months.”

“And the bracelet it is.” Beca mutters, sitting on the edge of the table and pulling her leg up to her lap.  There’s a clasp of some sort at the end, a complicated twisty mechanism, and she struggles to force it closed.

“Here, let me.”

All the breath escapes from Beca’s lungs when Chloe gets on her knees and takes Beca’s right ankle in her hands, fingers pushing up the hemmed edge of Beca’s jeans.

“Wait, Chloe-“

But she’s too late, and Chloe’s practiced hands are wrapped around the base of Beca’s ankle. Her hands are surprisingly soft, gentle in their ministrations as they attach and activate the tracking device, and Beca’s breath stumbles and trips as their skin brushes together again. When Chloe slides her pant leg back down, the resulting rush of arousal from simply having Chloe so close nearly knocks Beca off her perch on the table. Then Chloe’s standing back up and Beca’s leaning down and it’s only by luck that they stop moving at exactly the same time, a hairsbreadth away from each other.

Seeing Chloe Beale on her knees is a devastating event.

A second before Beca throws caution to the wind and brings her lips down Chloe’s, the gizmo on her ankle begins to beep. It’s activated. To Beca’s despair, Chloe clears her throat and steps away, taking her warmth and her touch with her. She looks down at her watch. Five o'clock.

“Are you hungry, by any chance?”

As if on cue, Beca’s stomach lets out an embarrassingly loud growl.

“Jesus Christ, yes.”

Chloe frowns.

“Wait, how long has it been since you’ve eaten?”

“Not since last night. So, um…almost a day?”

“What- the officer should’ve given you something this morning!”

“Oh, he did, but I threw the tray at the wall and told him where he could shove it. Damn cop, he-”

She stops abruptly when Chloe shuffles uncomfortably in her seat. It’s so damn easy to talk to Chloe that the words fall from her mouth without thinking, and she almost forgets the badge and the gun sitting next to her.

“Sorry, it just slipped out-“

Chloe touches Beca’s shoulder, and even though its barely there across layers of fabric, Beca shivers.

“We’re all not monsters, you know. Your situation, it’s not some sport to us. I’m sorry if someone treated you badly if you were here, but I can promise it won’t happen again. Not while you’re working with me.”

The skepticism doesn’t fade entirely, but when Chloe genuinely smiles at her for only the second time since they’d met, it’s almost sustenance in itself.

She’s still damn hungry though.

“Let me buy you dinner before I drive you back.”

“Dinner?”

Chloe shrugs.

“We’re on the same side now. Anyway, I wouldn’t let you go hungry even if we weren’t.”

“I won’t owe you anything, right?”

“Not a thing.”

Beca’s stomach growls again, and that pretty much decides it for her. They walk together down the hallway, and Beca’s never been so happy to see the sunlight and breathe fresh air in her entire life.

It only makes one thing clear; she never wants to go to prison again. Still, a nagging thought troubles Beca’s mind, as she gets into Chloe’s cruiser, it tangles her thoughts and refuses to let go.

Working with Chloe Beale was going to change the rest of her life. And after this was over, if she survived, Chloe would undoubtedly play a role in it.

Beca has no idea how to feel about that.

 

*

Chloe takes her to a Mexican restaurant near the station, and parks in a discreet spot under the cover of a few trees. Beca has her hand on the door when Chloe takes hold of her arm.

“Wait here.”

“What?”

“You have to stay in the car. I can’t- we can’t be seen together in public.”

A wave of shame and anger washes over her at Chloe’s words, and she recoils with a glare.

“Why the hell not?”

Chloe takes a step back, raises a confused hand.

“Because you have a reputation in this city and so do I. Someone even gets a whisper that we’re working together and they’ll tip off all the wrong people. It’ll put both our lives and the case in jeopardy.”

_Of course. You idiot, of course._

“O-okay.”

“Okay?”

“ _Okay_ , I get it.” Beca snaps, and looks away.

Chloe looks like she’s about to say something else, then closes her mouth and the door, walking away. Beca watches her retreating back enter the restaurant and hits herself on the forehead with her palm.

“Stupid, stupid.” She hisses into the silence of the empty car.

They hadn’t even spent an hour as compatriots and Beca was already seeing her judgment getting clouded. God, they were going to be fighting a murderer in a day’s time, and look where her mind was. She’s got to separate the real Chloe Beale from the person Beca wants her to be. She’s got to.

Beca closes her eyes.

Chloe comes back minutes later, throwing a greasy bag into the car. The smell of tacos fills the car and awakens Beca’s roaring stomach, and all thought leaves Beca’s mind as she tears into the food like a bulldozer. Previous awkwardness apparently forgiven, Chloe twists a fork around her salad and smiles in amusement.

“So tell me about yourself.”

Beca has a monstrous mouthful and has to spend a minute swallowing before she can answer.

“You just spent an hour interrogating me about my life. What else do you need to know?”

“I don’t know anything other than the absolute essentials, and I’d like to know you better than that. Anything.”

Beca maintains her stony silence, chewing slowly, and Chloe sets her food down on the dashboard with a long-suffering look.

“Well, if we’re going to work together, we need to trust one another. Look, why don’t you ask me a question first?”

“How’d you get to be a cop?”

Chloe pushes her hair back with one hand, clamping a straw between her teeth.

“I’ve always thought about it, in the back of my mind. My family was against it, at first, but I wanted to be part of the thin blue line, protect the people who needed it. So I attended academy just to see what it was like, thinking I could quit and be a lawyer or something, and I haven’t looked back. I was a regular officer on Detective rotation when this case came up. What was supposed to be a simple homicide turned into this mess and I’ve been at the station ever since. Just the way things worked out, I guess.”

She takes a bite of salad.

“So what about you? What drew you to Barden?”

Beca rubs a hand over her eyes.

“There’s not much to tell. I don’t know the other people in Barden too well. We just- exist around each other, you know? They don’t know what I do but they don’t pry about it either. I try to help then out as much as I can, but we’re all pretty much in the same sinking boat so everyone understands when you need to pull away and be selfish. It’s mostly just my best friend and I.”

“Hmm, Cynthia Rose, right? What’s her daughter’s name?”

“Alison. But I’m not talking about her, I don’t know you well enough yet. Try me again.”

“Other friends?”

“Rather not.”

“Family?”

“Okay, you’re just frigid now. Artic-levels of cold.”

Chloe throws her hands up in exasperation.

“Fine, fine. Let’s start simple- favorite color?”

“Hmm. Black.”

“Really? _Really?_ ”

“What? It goes with everything and sweat stains never show. What’s yours, _pink_?”

Chloe squirms in her seat and lifts one hand to her hair. Beca bursts out laughing.

“What- you’re a cop and your favorite color is _pink_?”

“You know what, forget it. Eat your damn taco.” Chloe throws the rest of the bag into Beca’s lap, grinning, and Beca smiles as she takes a bite.

They eat in silence for a long while, staring at nothing through the windshield. It’s rapidly approaching evening, and even the summer sun is fading a little on the horizon. Beca chews her words over before she says them.

“What’s going on with you and the blonde chick today?” She asks nonchalantly, crumpling the paper wrapping into a ball and reaching for a water bottle. She barely catches Chloe’s sharp intake of breath beside her.

“That _blonde chick_ is Detective Aubrey Posen, for your information, and she’s my best friend. And my commanding officer.”

“That explains a lot.”

She’s about to take another sip when Chloe stills her hand.

“Why would you say that?”

“Um- yelling at you in the hallway in front of everyone like that? Bossing you around, acting like a general bitch? She’s either your best friend or your boss, for you to put up with that much shit. And for you, apparently, she’s both- I couldn’t do it.”

Chloe drinks a sip of water and clears her throat.

“I stepped out of line, Beca. She’s a capable officer, and the review board back at station has all jurisdiction over civilian informants. There’s an extensive interview and verification process that has to be completed-“

“Bullshit, Chloe. You saw that my neighborhood was in danger and did what you had to- if Posen can’t see that she’s not doing her job right. You’re the only fucking cop who’s getting the job done. You care.”

It can’t be normal, how much of a word vomit just poured out of her mouth, but the grateful half-smile on Chloe’s face makes it entirely worth it.

 

*

The sun is fully setting now, setting the sky alight with tendrils of yellow and orange, and there are three empty Taco Bell wrappers under the passenger seat of Chloe’s car. Beca burps quietly, covering her mouth with her hand, and swiftly looks over to Chloe to see if she saw. Chloe starts to laugh, but trails off as she catches sight of the clock on the dashboard.

“Shoot, I have to get back to work soon. Can I drop you off somewhere? It’ll have to be several blocks outside of Barden, because-“

 “-because we can’t be seen together. Right.” Beca grumbles, and takes Chloe’s police-issue GPA in her hand. She prides herself on her extensive knowledge of every back alley and hidden cul-de-sac in the city, and it’s not difficult to map a route for Chloe to take that she can be certain no one will see the two of them. It helps that it’s getting rapidly dark, so the insignia of Chloe’s cruiser can’t be easily seen.

“Okay, drive.”

Chloe does, and within a half-hour they are secreted behind a Dumpster, behind a string of tenement buildings that Beca can navigate through all the way to Barden. Chloe is impressed, she can tell.

As Beca shuts the door behind her, Chloe leans towards the passenger side window.

“Remember, training starts at ten o’clock tomorrow. Officer Posen-“ She stops. “I mean, I’d like to get an early assessment on what you do and don’t know. Don’t worry, we won’t throw you into anything we think you’re not ready for.”

“Got it. ten o’clock tomorrow.” And Beca gives a little wave and walks away.

Chloe nods, and is about to start her engine when the small woman abruptly stops and runs back, rapping on Chloe’s car hood.

Chloe rolls down her window.

 “What is it?”

“I’m sorry about what I said this morning.”

Chloe draws a blank. “This morning” seemed a century ago, before everything fell simultaneously apart and into place again, all thanks to Beca Mitchell. The girl in question shuffles from foot to foot.

“About all of this being your fault, not catching the guy in time. I was angry and lashing out and- you’re not to blame. No one’s to blame but the fucking bastard who’s doing this, and I’m sorry I made you think any different.”

Chloe just stares at the steering wheel in her hands, tightening her grip until her knuckles tremble ever so slightly. When she gets the words out, they are tight in her throat.

“You spoke your mind. Half the time, I’m thinking the same thing you were.”

“Chloe, I-“

“Goodnight. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

She throws the shift into reverse, peering out through her back windshield. When she turns back, thought, Beca has disappeared into the darkening evening.


End file.
